SEOUL: North Korea for the first time showed images on Friday of the centrifuges that produce fuel for its nuclear bombs, as leader Kim Jong Un visited a uranium enrichment facility and called for more weapons-grade material to boost the arsenal.

The state media report on Kim’s visit to the Nuclear Weapons Institute and a production base for weapon-grade nuclear materials was accompanied by the first photos of the centrifuges, providing a rare look inside North Korea’s nuclear programme, which is banned under multiple United Nations Security Council resolutions.

The photos showed Kim walking between long rows of metal centrifuges, the machines that enrich uranium.

The report did not make clear when the visit occurred nor the facility’s location.

Kim urged workers to produce more material for tactical nuclear weapons, saying the country’s nuclear arsenal is vital for confronting threats from the United States and its allies.

The weapons are needed for “self-defence and the capability for a pre-emptive attack”, he said.

The North Korean leader said “anti-DPRK nuclear threats” from “US imperialists-led vassal forces” have crossed the red-line, according to the report.

South Korea condemned North Korea’s unveiling of its uranium enrichment facility and said it would never accept Pyongyang’s possession of nuclear weapons, the South’s unification ministry said.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby would not comment on the images. “I would simply say that we continue to monitor North Korean progression, both in their open nuclear ambitions as well as their ballistic missile technology and programme,” Kirby told reporters.

Published in Dawn, September 14th, 2024