They also come a day after a claim by North Korea of having developed a hydrogen and atomic bomb.
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Improving relations with the South is a priority for Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s young leader, who possibly wants tangible diplomatic and economic achievements before a convention of the ruling Workers’ Party in May, according to Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea expert at Seoul’s Dongguk University.
Reflecting on the significance of the Friday talks, the North’s chief negotiator remarked at the beginning that he hoped their meeting “could pave a major way for the two Koreas to march on by getting rid of a big wall of mistrust and confrontation”, which he said had been “hardened” by a lack of communication between the two sides.
Despite the distinction of an atomic bomb using fission to break up the atomic nucleus and release energy, and a hydrogen or thermonuclear bomb using fusion to add to the nucleus, both bombs would still lead to an uncontrolled, self-sustaining chain reactions and cause a lot of damage.
And a South Korean defense minister said, “We are closely monitoring and tracking any and all of North Korea’s nuclear activities”.
But White House spokesman Josh Earnest says the information the USA has access to “calls into serious question” those claims.
However, skepticism abounds among South Korea’s intelligence community. The Defense Ministry of South Korea said they had no intelligence on the claim of the North that they developed a hydrogen bomb.
The North has threatened to ruin its important ally, America, in a sea of fires and the South.
One individual using the name Tianping Kuihua, said Kim at one moment “is sending his imperial harems and beauties to attract the attention of the Chinese people, and another moment he is announcing he has a hydrogen bomb”. Lewis pointed to deuterium, a hydrogen isotope, or lithium-6, a key isotope in nuclear physics, as items that could make Pyongyang’s weapons more potent. Due to this, The United Nations imposed sanction on the country that prohibited trading and financial activities that may enhance its nuclear weapons program.
The band’s “friendship performances”, described by North Korea’s state media, are the latest sign that Pyongyang is trying to mend ties with Beijing after years of strain following the North’s third nuclear test in early 2013.
“We’ve moved, over time, a good deal of missile defense capability to the region… in order to be ready and vigilant for anything the North Koreans may or may not do”.
The site, known in North Korea as the Phyongchon Revolutionary Site, was visited several times by founding president Kim Il Sung, the current leader’s grandfather, and by his father, Kim Jong Il.
In September, however, the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) had raised a red flag over what appeared to be a new “hot cell” facility under construction at the North Korea’s main Yongbyon nuclear complex.
However, any such device it might be working on would be cruder and more old-fashioned than the classical H-bomb and would require larger nuclear tests than North Korea has yet conducted.
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North and South Korea remain in a technical state of war following the conflict, which ended in a truce rather than a peace treaty.
