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NKorea might be preparing for another nuclear test

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Published: 16:53, 30 March 2017   Update: 15:18, 26 July 2020
NKorea might be preparing for another nuclear test

International Desk: North Korea appears to be getting ready for another nuclear test, according to new satellite images that show a prolonged and heightened level of activity at its underground testing site.

It was not immediately possible to tell whether North Korea is putting on a performance for the satellites — a ploy it has sometimes used to raise tensions — or whether a sixth nuclear test is imminent. But analysts agree that North Korea is determined to make progress on its nuclear and missile programs.

“They are trying to get a working arsenal, so the more they test, the more they learn,” said Jon Wolfsthal, a senior nonproliferation adviser in the Obama administration who is now at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

“It’s likely that they’re trying to make a device small enough to achieve their goal of putting a nuclear warhead on a long-range missile,” Wolfsthal said.

North Korea has made no secret of its ambitions to build a missile capable of reaching the continental United States, and Kim Jong Un said in a Jan. 1 address that his regime had “entered the final stage of preparation for a test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile.”

It has been launching medium- and intermediate-range missiles and testing rocket engines at a surprisingly fast pace over the past year, tests that analysts view as part of a bigger ICBM program.

Pyongyang has also bragged about its progress with nuclear weapons, claiming after its last test in September that it had successfully miniaturized a warhead. At the time, a state news anchor warned the United States that North Korea was able to “counterattack” if its enemies invaded.

Agencies

risingbd/DHAKA/Mar 30, 2017/Amirul

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