Ankit Panda | Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Last week, Pete Hegseth, the nominee for U.S. defense secretary, made waves in South Korea by alluding to “[North Korea’s] status as a nuclear power” in his written answers to advance policy questions from the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee. Hours after his inauguration, President Donald Trump himself used that same phrase to describe North Korea in off-the-cuff remarks to reporters. South Korea’s foreign ministry pushed back on Hegseth’s answer, underscoring the country’s longstanding view that North Korea’s possession of nuclear weapons cannot be legitimated and that “Under the NPT (Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty), North Korea can never be recognized as a nuclear-armed state.”
Samia Nakhoul and Leela de Kretser | Reuters
Iran delivered a conciliatory message to Western leaders in Davos on Wednesday, with a top official denying it wants nuclear weapons and offering talks about opportunities, days after its arch adversary Donald Trump's return to the White House. However, the comments by Iran's Vice-President for Strategic Affairs Mohammad Javad Zarif coincided with a warning by the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog that Tehran is "pressing the gas pedal" in enriching uranium to near weapons-grade.
Gerry Doyle and Karen Lema | Reuters
The U.S. military has moved its Typhon launchers - which can fire multipurpose missiles up to thousands of kilometres - from Laoag airfield in the Philippines to another location on the island of Luzon, a senior Philippine government source said. The Tomahawk cruise missiles in the launchers can hit targets in both China and Russia from the Philippines; the SM-6 missiles it also carries can strike air or sea targets more than 200 km (165 miles) away.
Demetri Sevastopulo and Kathrin Hille | Financial Times
Two Iranian cargo vessels carrying a crucial chemical ingredient for missile propellant will sail from China to Iran over the next few weeks, according to intelligence from security officials in two western countries.The Iranian-flagged ships — the Golbon and the Jairan — are expected to carry more than 1,000 tonnes of sodium perchlorate, which is used to make ammonium perchlorate, the main ingredient for solid propellant for missiles.
Alannah Hill | NK News
New U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio held talks with his South Korean and Japanese counterparts for the first time on Wednesday, agreeing to maintain close cooperation on North Korean nuclear threats following Donald Trump’s inauguration. Rubio spoke with South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yul by phone and emphasized that the U.S.-ROK alliance is the “linchpin of peace and security not only on the Korean Peninsula but also in the region,” according to Seoul’s foreign ministry on Thursday. “Secretary Rubio affirmed that the U.S. commitment to the defense of South Korea remains as firm as iron, and the two ministers agreed to maintain close cooperation on the North Korean nuclear issue,” the statement added.
Lauren Thomas | The Wall Street Journal
Santee Cooper, the big power provider in South Carolina, has tapped financial advisers to look for buyers that can restart construction on a pair of nuclear reactors that were mothballed years ago.The state-owned utility is betting interest will be strong, with tech giants such as Amazon.com and Microsoft in need of clean energy to fuel data centers for artificial-intelligence capabilities.Santee Cooper announced Wednesday it is seeking proposals for buyers to complete the project at South Carolina’s sprawling V.C. Summer Nuclear Station, confirming an earlier report from The Wall Street Journal.