DPRK ready for another nuclear test any time: RoK
The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) is ready to conduct an additional nuclear test at any time, the Republic of Korea (RoK)'s Defence Ministry said on September 12, three days after Pyongyang's fifth test drew widespread condemnation.
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The DPRK set off its most powerful nuclear blast to date on September 9, saying it had mastered the ability to mount a warhead on a ballistic missile and ratcheting up a threat that its rivals and the United Nations have been powerless to contain.
"Assessment by RoK and US intelligence is that the DPRK is always ready for an additional nuclear test in the Punggye-ri area," the site of all five nuclear explosions, the RoK Defence Ministry spokesman Moon Sang-gyun told a news briefing.
"The DPRK has a tunnel where it can conduct an additional nuclear test," Moon said.
On September 12, Siegfried Hecker, a former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in the United States and a leading expert on the DPRK's nuclear program, said Pyongyang's claims that it had standardized a nuclear warhead for mounting on ballistic missiles and could produce as many bombs as it wanted had to be taken seriously.
