North Korea has started construction at its main nuclear-testing facility for the first time in nearly four years, new satellite imagery shows, following a recent suggestion by Pyongyang that it could return to major weapons launches.
Newly detected activity at the Punggye-ri test site—where all six of North Korea’s nuclear tests to date have occurred—include construction of a new building and possible repairs to another, according to researchers at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies who studied images taken Friday by Maxar Technologies. The images also showed other possible signs of continuing work, from suspected piles of lumber to sawdust, the researchers added.
“These changes have occurred only in the past few days,” wrote the report’s co-authors, Jeffrey Lewis and Dave Schmerler, on the Arms Control Wonk blog.
The shutdown of Punggye-ri in May 2018 had been one of the Kim Jong Un regime’s most prominent gestures toward disarmament. North Korea even invited a handful of foreign journalists to bear witness as it blew up underground tunnels, sealed off the entrances and imploded a variety of facilities.