North Korea builds secret military base, increasing its ‘potential nuclear threat,’ report warns

North Korea has completed work on a secret military base, effectively elevating the “potential nuclear threat” Pyongyang poses to the US and east Asia, a new report suggested.

Researchers from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington DC-based think tank, issued their findings this week claiming between six to nine nuclear-capable ballistic missiles could be kept at the facility.

Construction on the Sinpung-dong Missile Operating Base started in 2004 some 17 miles from North Korea’s border with China in the province of North Pyongan.

The base could also house thousands of soldiers, according to the report.

“These missiles pose a potential nuclear threat to East Asia and the continental United States,” the report found, noting it is unlikely the Hwasong-15 or Hwasong-18 ICBMs missiles have been fitted with warheads.

Researchers based their findings on interviews with defectors, global intelligence officials, declassified documents, satellite imagery and open-source information.

“Current assessments are that during times of crisis or war, these launchers and missiles will exit the base, meet special warhead storage/transportation units, and conduct launch operations from dispersed pre-surveyed sites,” reads the report.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute esitimates North Korea has assembled about 50 nuclear warheads and has enough fissile material to produce another 40 more.

The new base is one of about 15 to 20 undeclared ballistic missile bases and related facilities across the hermit kingdom.