There may be talks between us and the United States for the sake of arms reduction, but there will never be talks for denuclearization. Our position is clear. Never dream of denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula before denuclearization of the world is realised.A statement from Pyongyang, North Korea • Appearing in North Korea’s state newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, and not mincing words as to their attitude towards denuclearization — either nobody has them, or we have them. The North Korean nuclear program was first truly facilitated by Pakistani scientist AQ Khan, who outsourced his knowledge from extensive work producing an atomic bomb for Pakistan to spread nuclear weapons technology around, North Korea one of his chiefest clients. By 2006-2007, they’d claimed a successful nuclear test, and their status as a nuclear-armed nation. However insufficient their missile technologies, the North Korean power structure (headed up by Kim Jong-un) is clearly loathe to talk disarmament, lest they lose the main barrier to any interventionist military action against their state. source
The bottom line is simply that what Kim Jong Un is choosing to do is provocative. It is dangerous, reckless. The United States will not accept the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) as a nuclear state. …the United States will do what is necessary to defend ourselves and defend our allies, Korea and Japan. We are fully prepared and capable of doing so, and I think the DPRK understands that.U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry • Speaking sternly on a North Korean declaration to reopen its primary nuclear reactor complex in Yongbyon. North Korean state media reported that the reactors, as well as a uranium enrichment facility, were shut down and disabled as part of a 2007 agreement with the United States, which the government now plans to “readjust and restart.” This is not the first indication of a renewed international belligerence on the part of North Korea and its hereditary leader, Kim Jong-un — they also declared last week that they were entering a “state of war” with neighboring South Korea. source
North Korea is suspected of its third nuclear test after a seismic event was detected near the site of the regime’s previous tests. A UN Security Council diplomat has anonymously told Reuters that the event was in fact a test.
Read more about the event from CNN.
Follow updates on BreakingNews.com.
From the CNN report: “‘It’s a nuclear test,’ said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. ‘That magnitude and that location — it’s awfully unlikely it’s anything else.’”
In another sign of warming relations between two wartime foes, a senior North Korean nuclear negotiator will attend a security conference in the United States, a person with knowledge of the negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang told The Associated Press on Thursday.
Word of Ri Yong Ho’s visit to the forum at Syracuse University, where he may also meet on the sidelines with U.S. officials, comes on the heels of a breakthrough agreement that will provide much-needed U.S. food aid to North Korea in exchange for a rollback of its nuclear programs.
The agreement announced Wednesday sets in motion a plan laid out by North Korean leader Kim Jong Il before his death in December: to improve relations with the U.S. and to get back to six-nation disarmament-for-aid negotiations. Significant challenges remain, however, in achieving the long-term goal of the U.S. and other nations: to persuade Pyongyang to end its nuclear ambitions altogether.
Next thing you know, we’re gonna invite these guys to a slumber party or something and watch episodes of “Beavis & Butthead” or “Team America: World Police.” OK, maybe not that second movie …
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