North Korea is reportedly still upgrading one of its long-range missile bases.
And such activities are said to have been continuing even after the historic summit between the leaders of North Korea and the U.S. in June.
Park Hee-jun tells us more. If confirmed, it's another disappointing finding on North Korea's weapons activities.
According to CNN Wednesday, satellite imagery provided by the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey,... shows North Korea has been expanding a key long-range missile base in Yeongjeo-dong .
The base is in a mountainous region, just 20 kilometers south of the North Korea-China border.
Experts told CNN that the facility, which has long been familiar to the U.S., is a suitable location to receive the North's newest long-range missiles,... including those than can carry nuclear warheads to the U.S. mainland.
The images not only reveal significant activity at the base,... but also the construction of a new, previously-unknown facility,... just eleven kilometers away from the Yeongjeo-dong base.
It's unclear whether they are separate sites,... or whether one is a sub-base to another.
The images also suggest North Korea was building a large underground facility in 2017,... and the regime continued construction up until this August.
That means such activities were continuing even after the first North Korea-U.S. summit in Singapore in June.
There, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to work toward the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
The newly-discovered activities could be an indicator that months of dialogue with the North has done nothing to stop the regime from developing its weapons programs.
And that,... raises questions on the progress being made in pushing Pyeongyang toward complete denuclearization, and on the need for a second Kim-Trump summit.
Park Hee-jun, Arirang News.
