Also, the Japanese government and individual national universities, including Hokkaido University [1, in Japanese], have regulations on the export of technology that can be used for military purposes. I work at another national university in Japan, and there has been a lot of internal debate, with political overtones, about how strictly those regulations should be enforced and how to deal with technology that has both military and civilian applications. I can easily imagine the researchers at Hokkaido University deciding that the military coup in Myanmar meant that deploying the satellite would run the risk of violating the rules of either their own university or the Japanese government.
Would you really think to yourself "Well the contract doesn't say I can't do this"?...