South Korea intelligence chief says North Korea could conduct nuke test any time -- and such a test could be imminent

North Korea could conduct another atomic test “whenever it wants,” South Korea’s spy chief said this week, adding to security concerns as regional powers take slow but positive steps toward resuming peace talks with the unpredictable nuclear-armed state.

Intelligence officials had said earlier this year they have detected at least two new tunnels at the North’s nuclear test site in apparent preparation for a third atomic detonation following those made in 2006 and 2009.

Pyongyang also unveiled to an outside expert last November what is said to be a sophisticated uranium enrichment facility, sparking regional fears and moves to bring the case to the U.N. Security Council for condemnation. Uranium, when highly enriched, could give the communist state a second way to produce nuclear bombs, in addition to the existing plutonium.

“Yes, there is always a possibility of another nuclear test as (the North) has various nuclear test sites and is also constructing new ones,” Seoul’s National Intelligence Service chief Won Sei-Hoon told a parliamentary session Tuesday.

Pyongyang was faced with the deepest international isolation ever after leaving the six-nation denuclearization talks at the end of 2008 and conducting a second nuclear test.

The North, for decades, has employed a two-track strategy of offering to discuss denuclearization with dialogue partners ― South Korea, the U.S., Japan, Russia and China ― while keeping up its nuclear ambitions. (read more)