North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has supervised the test-firing of a new tactical weapon with a “powerful warhead”, state media reported Thursday, in the first test of its kind since nuclear negotiations with Washington stalled.
The test marks a ratcheting up of tensions weeks after a summit between Kim and US President Donald Trump collapsed without agreement.
It also comes after satellite imagery suggested heightened activity at a nuclear test site.
Wednesday’s test was “conducted in various modes of firing at different targets” the Korean Central News Agency reported, adding that Kim “guided the test-fire”.
The report said Kim described its development as one “of very weighty significance in increasing the combat power of the People’s Army”.
The “advantages” of the weapon were “the peculiar mode of guiding flight and the load of a powerful warhead”, KCNA said.
Its report gave no details of the weapon.
South Korea had not detected anything on radar so it was unlikely to have been a missile, a military official told AFP.
“When North Korea launches a missile, our radar catches it. But no missile was detected,” said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Seoul’ presidential office said it had no comment.
