The test proved a great success and is of significance in strengthening the country’s nuclear forces and defense capabilities, said KCNA, adding that the engine of the intercontinental ballistic rocket met all scientific and technological indexes.
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“Dear Comrade Kim Jong-un said now we can mount an ever more powerful nuclear warhead on a new intercontinental ballistic rocket and put the den of evil in the United States and all over the world within our strike range”, the news agency said. “It’s apparently asserting that it is capable of attacking the USA mainland any time if it wants”.
Earlier this year in January, North Korea conducted their fourth nuclear-weapon test which several governments condemned including Beijing.
Pyongyang has made a string of similar claims recently about its ability to destroy cities in South Korea, Japan and the United States.
The North argued on March 24 that it conducted the successful test of a “solid-fuel rocket engine and its cascade separation” inspected by Kim.
Some North Korean restaurant staff in China were visibly nervous on Saturday about news reports that 13 North Koreans working at a restaurant in a foreign country have defected to South Korea.
In the run-up to the event, North Korea has issued a series of bellicose threats and fired missiles or rockets into the sea, despite facing new worldwide sanctions.
Such sanctions are created to deplete Pyongyang’s ability to fund the ballistic-missile program, the results of which analysts believe Pyongyang will start to take effect between six months to a year from now.
Outside experts have treated a number of the claims with scepticism, suggesting the North Korean leadership is attempting to talk up its achievements ahead of a showcase ruling party congress next month.
The North has also claimed to have mastered a re-entry technology created to protect a warhead from extreme heat and other challenges when it returns to the atmosphere from space following a missile launch.
They conducted the test at the North’s missile station near its west coast.
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