SEOUL: North Korea is carrying out rapid improvements to its nuclear research facility, a monitor said on Wednesday, despite declaring a commitment to denuclearization of the peninsula at the Singapore summit.
The nuclear-armed North’s leader Kim Jong Un promised to “work toward” the goal at a landmark summit in the city-state earlier this month with US President Donald Trump.
But the Singapore meeting failed to clearly define denuclearization or produce a specific timeline toward dismantling the North’s atomic weapons arsenal.
Trump claimed the process would start quickly, saying last week that “It will be a total denuclearization, which is already taking place.”
But recent satellite imagery showed that not only were operations continuing at present at the North’s main Yongbyon nuclear site, it was also carrying out infrastructure works, said the respected 38 North website.
“Commercial satellite imagery from June 21 indicates that improvements to the infrastructure at... Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center are continuing at a rapid pace,” it said.
It noted “continued operations” at the North’s uranium enrichment plant and several new installations at the site — including an engineering office and a driveway to a building housing a nuclear reactor.
But continued operations at the site “should not be seen as having any relationship with North Korea’s pledge to denuclearise,” it added.
Nuclear officials could be “expected to proceed with business as usual until specific orders are issued from Pyongyang,” it said.
The North last month blew up its aged but only nuclear test site at Punggye-ri — where it had staged six atomic tests — in a show of goodwill before the summit.
But Pyongyang has kept its counsel on the denuclearization issue since the meeting, although state media have dialled down propaganda against the US, long dubbed the “imperialist enemy.”
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been pushing for more follow-up talks to flesh out details over denuclearization but no date has been set for when they would take place.
North Korea still building at nuclear site: monitor
North Korea still building at nuclear site: monitor
France to open consulate in Greenland in February
- The comments came on the day that Denmark’s top diplomat is to meet senior US officials at the White House for talks over Greenland
PARIS: France will open a consulate in Greenland on February 6, the foreign minister said Wednesday, calling the move a “political signal” over the strategic Danish territory, which US President Donald Trump has vowed to seize.
The comments came on the day that Denmark’s top diplomat is to meet senior US officials at the White House for talks over the future of vast, mineral-rich Arctic island.
Since returning to office nearly a year ago, Trump has repeatedly mused about taking over Greenland from longtime ally and European Union member Denmark.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told French RTL broadcaster that the decision to open the consulate was taken last summer, when President Emmanuel Macron visited Greenland in a show of support.
“For my part, I went there at the end of August to plan the consulate, which will open on February 6,” he said.
“It’s a political signal that’s associated with a desire to be more present in Greenland, including in the scientific field.”
“Greenland does not want to be owned, governed... or integrated into the United States. Greenland has made the choice of Denmark, NATO, (European) Union,” he said.
Greenland’s leader has said that the island would choose to remain an autonomous territory of Denmark over the United States.
Trump has said the United States needs Greenland due to the threat of a takeover by Russia or China.
The two rival powers have both stepped up activity in the Arctic, where ice is melting due to climate change, but neither claims Greenland, where the United States has long had a military base.
