Itongadol.- After North Korea announced on Wednesday that it had successfully tested a miniaturized hydrogen nuclear bomb, National Infrastructure, Energy and Water Minister Yuval Steinitz linked the test to Israel\’s suspicions regarding the Iranian nuclear program.
"The test reminds us all that the most important mission is to prevent a similar thing from taking place in Iran: a nuclear agreement first and nuclear weapons later."
Steinitz said that North Korea does not only threaten nations in the Far East, noting that in the past it had transferred nuclear technology to Syria and apparently to Iran as well.
"Israel and the US should increase intelligence sharing in order to ensure that Iran is not breaching its nuclear agreement through involvement in North Korea\’s nuclear project," Steinitz said.
In July of last year world powers adopted a final, comprehensive agreement with Iran that will govern its nuclear program for over a decade.
In 1994, North Korea signed a nuclear agreement with the US, under the administration of former US president Bill Clinton. He said at the time that the deal meant "North Korea will freeze and then dismantle its nuclear program. South Korea and our other allies will be better protected. The entire world will be safer as we slow the spread of nuclear weapons.”
Clinton said that the “United States and international inspectors will carefully monitor North Korea to make sure it keeps its commitments. Only as it does so will North Korea fully join the community of nations."
Twelve years later, in 2006, North Korea detonated its first underground nuclear explosion.
Following the nuclear test on Wednesday, which set off alarm bells in Japan and South Korea, North Korea claimed a significant advance in its strike capability.
The test, the fourth time the isolated state has exploded a nuclear device, was ordered by young leader Kim Jong Un and successfully conducted at 10:00 a.m. local time (0130 GMT), North Korea\’s official KCNA news agency said.
"Let the world look up to the strong, self-reliant nuclear-armed state," Kim wrote in what North Korean state TV displayed as a handwritten note.