North Korea releases images of uranium enrichment facility for first time
- In Reports
- 12:05 PM, Sep 13, 2024
- Myind Staff
North Korea, for the first time, released images of its uranium enrichment facility on Friday, showing leader Kim Jong Un inspecting the site. During his visit, Kim called for an increase in the number of centrifuges to expand the country's nuclear arsenal.
Kim Jong Un inspected North Korea's Nuclear Weapons Institute and an unnamed facility responsible for producing weapons-grade nuclear materials, according to a report by the official Korean Central News Agency on Friday. The report did not specify the date of the visit.
Photos accompanying the report showed the North Korean leader walking with other officials in a massive hall containing rows of centrifuges that enrich uranium by spinning it at high speeds. Such facilities produce highly enriched uranium -- which is needed to produce nuclear warheads.
Kim "stressed the need to further augment the number of centrifuges in order to exponentially increase the nuclear weapons for self-defence," state media reported.
Kim "acquainted himself with the production of nuclear warheads and current nuclear materials," the report said.
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The North Korean leader was briefed about the facility "dynamically producing nuclear materials by studying, developing and introducing all the system elements including centrifugal separators," KCNA said.
Kim urged the facility to "push forward the introduction of a new-type centrifuge... so as to further strengthen the foundation for producing weapon-grade nuclear materials".
Kim also "stressed the need to set a higher long-term goal in producing nuclear materials necessary", added KCNA.
North Korea, which carried out its first nuclear test in 2006 and is under numerous UN sanctions for its banned weapons programmes, has never previously disclosed details of its uranium enrichment facility to the public.
Experts suggest that North Korea's sudden public disclosure of its uranium enrichment facility might be aimed at influencing the upcoming US presidential election in November.
The images are "a message to the next administration that it will be impossible to denuclearise North Korea", Hong Min, a senior analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification, told AFP.
"It is also a message demanding other countries to acknowledge North Korea as a nuclear state," he added.
It is unlikely that the disclosure will be quickly followed by another nuclear test, he said.
Last month, Pyongyang reported that a record downpour in late July had caused fatalities, without specifying the number, while flooding homes and submerging large areas of farmland in its northern regions near the border with China.
On Wednesday, 38 North, a North Korean analysis programme run by the Stimson Centre think tank, reported that North Korea's main nuclear test site had sustained damage due to floodwaters.
North Korea's main nuclear test site "is in very bad condition. All roads and railways have been lost due to rain damage, and the ground is very weakened," Hong added.
Relations between North and South Korea have reached one of their lowest points in years, with North Korea recently deploying 250 ballistic missile launchers along its southern border. Additionally, the North has been sending balloons carrying trash into South Korea, including a five-day blitz last week.
On Thursday, Seoul reported that North Korea had launched multiple short-range ballistic missiles into the waters east of the Korean peninsula.
In a separate report on Friday, North Korea's official news agency, KCNA, stated that the launch was a test of a "new-type 600mm multiple rocket launcher," which was personally overseen by Kim Jong Un.
Image source: Reuters
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