NKOREA CLAIMS H-BOMB TEST ‘A PERFECT SUCCESS’
SEOUL: North Korea said Sunday it had tested a hydrogen bomb which it can mount on a missile, declaring nuclear detonation and presenting a potent challenge to President Donald Trump.
Pyongyang has long sought the means to deliver an atomic warhead to the United States, its sworn enemy, and the test will infuriate Washington and regional powers. China, the North’s main ally, issued a swift condemnation.
A jubilant newsreader on state television hailed the “unprecedent- could be mounted on a missile.
- she added.
Hydrogen bombs or H-bombs — also known as thermonuclear devices — are far more powerful than the relatively simple atomic weapons the North was believed to have tested so far.
Hours earlier, the North released images of leader Kim Jong- Un at the Nuclear Weapons
Institute, inspecting what it said was a miniaturized H- bomb intercontinental ballistic missile ( ICBM).
China, Pyongyang’s main diplomatic protector, lost no time in issuing “strong condemnation” in Shanghai by leader Xi Jinping.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe described the test as “absolutely unacceptable.”
“North Korea’s nuclear and missile development program is a threat that is more grave and - try and has entered a new stage,” Abe said.
In Seoul, President Moon Jae-In - tions to “completely isolate North Korea” and said the South would discuss deploying “the strongest
- ence to tactical nuclear weapons, which were withdrawn by Wash by the allies and alarm Pyongyang,
6.3- magnitude tremor near the North’s main testing site, which a year ago.
- eastern China, with people in the their homes in their underwear,
test’s yield turned out to be, said - thermonuclear weapon” which its weapons program.
Chinese monitors said they had detected a second tremor shortly could be due to a “collapse (cave underground blast had given way.
‘Super explosive power’
Pyongyang triggered a new ramp an ICBM, the Hwasong-14, which
It has since threatened to send
and loaded.”
Analysts believe Pyongyang has been developing weapons capability to give it a stronger hand in any
“North Korea will continue with their nuclear weapons program North Korean Studies told Agence France Presse.
tests in total, and may not have
state, he said.
Weapons Institute showed the
- and technology,” KCNA cited Kim as saying, and “all components domestically made.”
Actually mounting a warhead onto a missile would amount to North’s part, as it would create a
Pyongyang, which says it needs
- tember last year, caused a 5.3 device which destroyed Hiroshima in 1945.
Security Council sanctions over its nuclear and ballistic missile programs, but always insists it will continue to pursue them.
No H-bomb has ever been used