North Korea – Military – Nuclear

North Korea Leader Orders Nuclear Warhead Test, Missile Launches

North Korea Leader Orders Nuclear Warhead Test, Missile Launches
Tue Mar 15, 2016 10:07:09

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un has ordered an imminent nuclear warhead explosion test and multiple ballistic missile launches, just weeks after being slapped with tough, new UN sanctions, state media reported Tuesday.

The order came after Kim monitored the successful lab-test of the warhead re-entry technology required for a nuclear strike on the US mainland, the North’s official KCNA news agency said.

Kim’s comments were the latest in a series of daily statements and warnings by Pyongyang, talking up the North’s nuclear strike capabilities and threatening attacks on Seoul and Washington.

The main focus of the threats have been ongoing, large-scale military exercises by South Korea and the United States that Pyongyang has condemned as rehearsals for invasion.

In order to boost the reliability of the nation’s nuclear deterrent still further, Kim said a nuclear warhead explosion test and test firings of “several kinds” of ballistic rockets would be carried out “in a short time.”

The warning came days after state media released photos of Kim posing with what was claimed to be a miniaturized nuclear warhead capable of fitting on a ballistic missile.

Kim had said last week that the North was planning to conduct new tests to gauge the “destructive power” of the new, miniaturized warheads.

While North Korea is known to have a small stockpile of nuclear weapons, its ability to deliver them accurately to a chosen target on the tip of a ballistic missile has been a subject of heated debate, AFP reported.

S/SH 11

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