Nth Korea plots to keep arsenal

US intelligence officials, citing newly obtained evidence, have concluded that North Korea does not intend to fully surrender its nuclear stockpile, and instead is considering ways to conceal the number of weapons it has and secret production facilities, according to US officials.

The evidence, collected in the wake of the June 12 summit in Singapore, points to preparations to deceive the United States about the number of nuclear warheads in North Korea’s arsenal as well as the existence of undisclosed facilities used to make fissile material for nuclear bombs, the officials said.

The findings support a new, previously undisclosed Defence Intelligence Agency estimate that North Korea is unlikely to denuclearise.

The assessment stands in stark contrast to President Donald Trump’s comments after the summit, when he declared that ‘‘there is no longer a nuclear threat’’ from North Korea.

Intelligence officials and many North Korea experts have generally taken a more cautious view, noting that leader Kim Jong Un’s vague commitment to denuclearise the Korean Peninsula is a near-echo of earlier pledges from North Korean leaders over the past two decades, even as they accelerated efforts to build nuclear weapons in secret.

The new intelligence, described by four officials who have seen it or received briefings, is based on material gathered since the summit. The officials insisted on anonymity to discuss sensitive assessments about a country that has long been one of the most difficult targets for spy agencies to penetrate. Some aspects of the US intelligence were reported Saturday.

Specifically, the DIA has concluded that North Korean officials are exploring ways to deceive Washington about the number of nuclear warheads, and missiles and the types and numbers of facilities they have, believing that the United States is not aware of the full range of their activities. US intelligence agencies have for at least a year believed that the number of warheads is about 65. But North Korean officials are suggesting that they declare far fewer.

The lone weapons facility that has been acknowledged by North Korea is in Yongbyon, 96 kilometres north of Pyongyang.

Meanwhile, the North Koreans also have operated a secret underground uranium enrichment site known as Kangson. That site is believed by most officials to have twice the enrichment capacity of Yongbyon.

North Korea expert David Albright, a former United Nations weapons inspector and president of the Institute for Science and International Security, said the assessments come at a time when ‘‘there’s a worry that the Trump administration may go soft, and accept a deal that focuses on Yongbyon and forgets about these other sites’’. –