North Korea’s main nuclear site, satellite images showed a high level of activity, a US think tank reported. This comes after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ordered nuclear scientists to increase the production of weapons-grade material to make bombs to expand the country’s range of weapons.
The Washington-based 38 North, a monitoring project to track activities in North Korea, said that it had spotted images that could indicate an Experimental Light Water Reactor (ELWR) at the Youngbyon site was nearing completion and transition to operational status, Reuters reported.
The satellite images were obtained between March 3 to March 17. The photographs also revealed a five megawatt reactor at Yongbyon continued its operation and a new construction had started around the site’s uranium enrichment plant, likely to increase the reactor’s capabilities.
Satellite images from March 17 showed that a new building with approximately 20 rooms on the base floor is being constructed. According to the report, this building is likely to serve as an administrative structure to accommodate additional staff required to operate the reactor or will be used as “research and engineering spaces”.
“These developments seem to reflect Kim Jong Un’s recent directive to increase the country’s missile material production to expand its nuclear weapons arsenal,” the report added, referring to Kim Jong Un.
Earlier in the week North Korea unveiled new smaller nuclear warheads and vowed to produce more nuclear material to expand its arsenal, it also denounced the increase in military exercises by South Korea and the United States.
The Korean Central News Agency said Kim, during a meeting with officials and scientists at a state nuclear weapons institute, stressed the need to ramp up bomb fuel production to meet his goals to expand his nuclear arsenal “exponentially,” and issued unspecified “important tasks” for his nuclear industry.
The North Korean military has been carrying out multiple drills in recent weeks, including the test-firing of what state media described as an underwater nuclear-capable drone and the second launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile this year.
While it is unclear whether North Korea has fully developed miniaturised nuclear warheads to fir on smaller weapons, scientists have said that it is likely the country’s key goal if ut resumes nuclear testing for the first time since 2017.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), in a report, last year, estimated that North Korea had assembled up to 20 nuclear warheads, and probably possessed sufficient fissile material for approximately 45-55 nuclear devices.