This Friday, North Korean media reported for the first time their uranium enrichment facilities by reporting a visit Kim Jong Un at the National Institute for Nuclear Weapons Research, where the leader called for building more centrifuges to increase the country’s atomic arsenal.
The images released by the KCNA news agency show Kim visiting a plant producing fissile materials for bombs – without specifying the date and location of the facilities – with Hong Sung-mu, a leading figure in the North’s nuclear program, and walking through a room where a waterfall can be seen. gas centrifuges.
During the visit, Kim “stressed the need to further increase the number of centrifuges exponentially increase the number of nuclear weapons for self-defense, in line with the Party’s guidelines to develop nuclear forces,” according to KCNA. Kim, who visited the facility’s control room and received instructions on its operation, “expressed great satisfaction after being informed that the current production of nuclear materials (for bombs) is expanding steadily” thanks to the use and development of North Korean technology. The leader ordered to further improve the separation capacity of centrifuges and promote the introduction of a new type of centrifuge, the development of which is in its final stage, according to the agency.
Kim Jong-un, who also visited warehouses under construction to house more centrifuges, once again stressed that his country’s current security landscape represents a “threat“and that this requires improving nuclear capabilities in defensive terms and launching preemptive attacks.
So far, the North Korean regime had never publicly shown any of his installations to obtain uranium 235, although it did allow figures such as the American scientist Siegfried Hecker to visit early last decade a facility at the Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center – about 100 kilometers north of Pyongyang – that contained some 2,000 centrifuge gases.
Missile launch
North Korean media also released reports on Friday about two other military-related activities by Kim. On the one hand, KCNA reported that the leader had supervised the launch of testsdetected by Seoul and Tokyo, from several tactical missiles of the system known as KN-25. The test was aimed at testing the new drive system of the mobile erector shuttle and verifying, through missile salvos, the operational effectiveness of the firing system, which, according to KCNA, is fully automated.
In turn, the North Korean marshal visited a base of a unit of army special forces and witnessed their extreme physical training, shooting drills – Kim himself held new models of assault and sniper rifles in his hands – and infiltration exercises that included the participation of paratrooper brigades.
Message to Seoul and Washington
These last two activities seem to send a specific message to South Koreawhich Kim declared earlier this year as the main national enemy. In turn, it is believed that the publication of the leader’s visit to the facilities for the production of fissile material for atomic bombs is aimed at boasting about its nuclear capabilities of the regime just over seven weeks before the elections US presidential elections.
Seoul and Washington have warned that Pyongyang may soon choose to implement weapons of mass destruction testing projectsuch as a nuclear test or the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), in order to underline the positions of the regime – which has refused invitations to dialogue since 2019 – for whoever will be elected president of the United States.
