N Korea’s nuclear warnings seen as a push for US talks
SEOUL: A day after threatening long-range rocket launches, North Korea declared yesterday that it has upgraded and restarted all of its atomic fuel plants, so it can produce more sophisticated nuclear weapons.
Neither announcement was entirely unexpected and global analysts see the back-to-back warnings as part of a general North Korean playbook of using claimed improvements in its nuclear and missile programmes to push for talks with the US that could eventually provide the impoverished country with concessions and eased sanctions.
But the threats could deepen a stand-off between North Korea and the US and its allies because they strike at Washington’s fear that each North Korean rocket and nuclear test puts it another big step closer to its stated goal of an arsenal of nuclear-tipped, long-range missiles that can hit the US mainland.
North Korea has spent decades trying to develop just such a weapon, and while it is thought to have a small arsenal of atomic bombs and an impressive array of short- and medium-range missiles, it has yet to demonstrate it can produce nuclear bombs small enough to place on a missile or can make reliable long-range missiles.
Still, it has conducted three nuclear tests and a series of steadily improving long-range rocket launches, and some analysts see yesterday’s announcement as foreshadowing an upcoming fourth nuclear test, which would push North Korea further along in its nuclear aims.
North Korea said yesterday in its state media that, as it pledged to do in 2013, the plutonium and highly enriched uranium facilities at its main Nyongbyon nuclear complex have finally been “rearranged, changed or readjusted and they started normal operation”.
It said its scientists had improved “the levels of nuclear weapons with various missions in quality and quantity”.
North Korea closely controls information about its nuclear programme, which it describes as a sovereign right meant to combat US military hostility. As a result, just what is happening is unclear.
North Korea booted out international inspectors in 2009 and independent assessments by outside experts since then have been spotty.
At various points in the decades-long stand-off over its nuclear ambitions, North Korea has said it has shut down or restarted its atomic fuel production. – AP
Scientists had improved ‘the levels of nuclear weapons on various missions’