A think tank said Monday it has identified 13 North Korean secret missile facilities amid stalled talks between the regime and the Trump administration over its nuclear program.
The sites are among an estimated 20 that the North continues to maintain even as it has halted test launches of missiles, including intercontinental ballistic missiles during the on-again, off-again negotiations, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.
The CSIS report comes as North Korea has canceled an upcoming meeting in New York with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. But President Trump has insisted the administration is in no rush to reach a deal and is eyeing another face-to-face meeting North Korea dictator Kim Jong Un.
“These missile operating bases, which can be used for all classes of ballistic missile from short-range ballistic missile (SRBM) up to and including intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), would presumably have to be subject to declaration, verification, and dismantlement in any final and fully verifiable denuclearization deal,” CSIS reported.
The North’s use of the secrets sites casts more doubt on the administration’s claims that it is ready to abandon its nuclear program, which analysts believe may now be capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to areas across the country.
Existence of the missile sites have been widely known but the CSIS report sheds greater light on the number and location, as well as the challenge ahead for Trump following his historic meeting with Kim in Singapore in June.
“To call this a ‘deception’ is deeply misleading. Kim Jong Un publicly stated that North Korea would shift to the mass producing nuclear weapons in 2018. These bases and their missiles are well-known, long-standing and have never been offered for dismantlement by the DPRK,” tweeted Jeffrey Lewis, a North Korea arms analyst and author of a book about war with the regime.
