{"id":124381,"date":"2026-04-15T19:57:16","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T14:57:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/?p=124381"},"modified":"2026-04-15T19:57:27","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T14:57:27","slug":"north-korea-boosting-ability-to-make-nuclear-arms-un-watchdog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/","title":{"rendered":"North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Pyongyang(National Times)- North Korea is showing a \u201cvery serious increase\u201d in its ability to produce atomic weapons, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog said on Wednesday on a visit to Seoul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The diplomatically isolated north is believed to operate multiple facilities for enriching uranium, a key step in making nuclear warheads, South Korea\u2019s spy agency has said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>They include one at the Yongbyon nuclear site, which Pyongyang purportedly&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1643491\">decommissioned<\/a>&nbsp;after talks but later reactivated in 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIn our periodic assessments, we have been able to confirm that there\u2019s a rapid increase in the operations\u201d of the Yongbyon reactor, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi told reporters in Seoul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The agency also observed a rise in operations at Yongbyon\u2019s reprocessing unit and light-water reactor, as well as the activation of other facilities, Grossi said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cAll that points to a very serious increase in the capabilities of (the) Democratic People\u2019s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in the area of nuclear weapons production, which is estimated at a few dozen warheads,\u201d he said, using North Korea\u2019s official name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>North Korea, which conducted its first nuclear test in 2006, is under rafts of UN sanctions for its banned weapons programmes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It has declared that it will never surrender its nuclear weapons, and cut off access to IAEA inspectors in 2009.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The agency has noted the construction of a \u201cnew facility similar to the enrichment facility in Yongbyon\u201d, Grossi said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was \u201cnot easy to calculate\u201d any production increases without visiting the site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, \u201cwe consider, looking at external features of the facility, that there will be significant increase in the enrichment capacity of the DPRK\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Asked whether Russia was assisting North Korea\u2019s nuclear development, Grossi said the IAEA had not seen \u201canything in particular in that regard\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>North Korea has sent ground troops and artillery shells to support Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, and observers say Pyongyang is receiving military technology assistance from Moscow in return.<a><br><br><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pyongyang(National Times)- North Korea is showing a \u201cvery serious increase\u201d in its ability to produce atomic weapons, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog said on Wednesday on a visit to Seoul. The diplomatically isolated north is believed to operate multiple facilities for enriching uranium, a key step in making nuclear warheads, South Korea\u2019s spy [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":124382,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-124381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international","entry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog - Nation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog - Nation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Pyongyang(National Times)- North Korea is showing a \u201cvery serious increase\u201d in its ability to produce atomic weapons, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog said on Wednesday on a visit to Seoul. The diplomatically isolated north is believed to operate multiple facilities for enriching uranium, a key step in making nuclear warheads, South Korea\u2019s spy [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-04-15T14:57:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-04-15T14:57:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/image-670x370-17-4.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"670\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"370\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"humza Jahangir\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"humza Jahangir\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/\",\"name\":\"North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog - Nation\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/image-670x370-17-4.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-04-15T14:57:16+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-04-15T14:57:27+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/27efa35fa76e99f3ad7e7397d7332c16\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/image-670x370-17-4.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/image-670x370-17-4.png\",\"width\":670,\"height\":370},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/\",\"name\":\"Nation\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/27efa35fa76e99f3ad7e7397d7332c16\",\"name\":\"humza Jahangir\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/43feedd99bd6a90080d1621b7e6604364acb673ee979d3ffe5075557c14c68b9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/43feedd99bd6a90080d1621b7e6604364acb673ee979d3ffe5075557c14c68b9?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"humza Jahangir\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/author\/humza\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog - Nation","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/nationaltimes.pk\/eng\/2026\/124381\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"North Korea boosting ability to make nuclear arms: UN watchdog - Nation","og_description":"Pyongyang(National Times)- North Korea is showing a \u201cvery serious increase\u201d in its ability to produce atomic weapons, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog said on Wednesday on a visit to Seoul. 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