A seismic tremor early Sunday indicated that North Korea had conducted a sixth nuclear test.
The Japanese government concluded that the tremor was❀ a nuclear explosion based on seismological data, the foreign minister said in a live television broadcas💃t.
The US Geological Survey said it detected a 🌠5.6 magnitude earthquake near the rogue state’s known nuclear test site, .
Earlier Sunday, Pyongyang claimed it💙 has developed a hydrogen bomb that can be mounted on the tip of an intercontinental ballistic mಌissile — and threatened a high-altitude nuclear explosion that experts fear could wipe out US electrical networks.
Dictator Kim Jong-un personally inspected the loading of the H-bomb onto the ICBM during a visit to the North’s Nuclear Weapons Institute, Pyongyang’s state media🅺 said Sunday.
Kim’s claim could not be independently confirmed Saturdayඣ and will be met with doubt by 🌠some experts, the Associated Press reported.
Other experts told The Wall Street Jo😼urnal that such a blast would create an electromagnetic pulse that would cripple US electrical networks.
“The explosive power of the bomb෴ is adjustable from tens kiloton to hundreds kiloton,” the state run Korean Central News Agency said Sunday.
The new weapon ꦗis “a multi-functional thermonuclear nuke with great destructive power that can be detonated even at high altitudes for superpowerful EMP [electromagnetic pulse attack] according to strategic goals,” state media said.
North Korea also boasted that all of the components of the new weapon were “ho🦩memade,” thus “enabling the country to produce powerful nuclear weapons, as many as it wants,” without worrying about import sanctions.
Last month, Kim threatened to launc𒀰h missiles toward the US Pa⛄cific territory of Guam.
President Trump escalated tensions by responding in tweets th✅at and that “Military solutions are locked and loaded should North Korea act unwisely.”
In other Korean Peninsula news, Trump told advisers to prepare to🌳 withdraw the US from a free-trade agreeಌment with Seoul.
The move could stoke economic tensions with South Korea, an important US ally in the ♛crisis over the North’s nuclear program, the Washington Post noted late Saturday.
With Post Wire Services