(Bloomberg) -- North Korea released its first photos of a facility to enrich uranium for atomic bombs, showing leader Kim Jong Un touring a plant at the center of a program that has been a point of friction with the US for more than 20 years.
Kim visited the Nuclear Weapons Institute, which is the production base of weapon-grade nuclear materials, the state’s official media reported Friday. “He stressed the need to further augment the number of centrifuges in order to exponentially increase the nuclear weapons for self-defense,” the official Korean Central News Agency said.
It is extremely rare for North Korea to disclose its uranium enrichment facilities. South Korea’s Unification Ministry “strongly condemned” North Korea for vowing to accelerate its nuclear weapons program.
The images are certain to be scrutinized by the US and its partners, as well as by weapons experts, to get a better idea of the equipment North Korea uses to enrich uranium and how much it could produce.
The visit came as Kim has reiterated his pledge to ramp up production of nuclear weapons. It also indicates Pyongyang no longer sees any reason to hide its program to enrich uranium, which it once furiously denied when then President George W. Bush first made the accusation in 2002.
“Ultimately, they are saying that denuclearization is a nonstarter,” said Hong Min, a researcher at the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul.
The release of the images sends a message to the US as it heads into presidential elections that Kim intends to keep producing nuclear weapons, Hong said.
South Korean officials have said North Korea may be considering a nuclear test near the time of the election to raise its profile. North Korea last tested a nuclear device in September 2017, which was its most powerful atomic bomb by far with an estimated yield of between 120-250 kilotons.
North Korea initially relied on plutonium production for fissile material, turning out enough for about one bomb a year. But with its program to enrich uranium, it can now produce enough fissile material for about six nuclear weapons a year, according to arms experts.
North Korea is estimated to have about 80 to 90 warheads, the Seoul-based Korea Institute for Defense Analyses said in a paper released in January 2023, adding Kim was looking to have between 100 to 300 over the long term.
It also has at least two facilities to enrich uranium. The first is at its main Yongbyon nuclear research facility, a complex about 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of Pyongyang that has been visited by outside scientific observers. Another is in Kangson, a covert facility near Pyongyang.
Ankit Panda, an expert on nuclear policy at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, posted on the X social media platform that the images released by North Korea may be from inside the Kangson facility. The 38 North website specializing in North Korea reported in March that satellite imagery indicated the country had been expanding the facility in what appeared to be a bid to add more centrifuges.
KCNA also said that Kim this week oversaw the test-fire of a new multiple rocket launcher and visited the special operation unit of North’s Korean People’s Army as he urged troops to “intensify the drills for real war.”
(Updates with analysis, reaction from South Korea.)
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