Tokyo, May 14: A man claiming to be a former North Korean People's Army General who fled the impoverished state last year has told a Japanese publication that Pyongyang secretly imported nuclear bombs from the former Soviet Union and developed dozens of its own weapons. The claims were among details about the Stalinist state's military command and its leader Kim Jong-Il contained in an article in the June edition of the respected Gekkan Gendai (modern times monthly), based on an interview. The General told the magazine that North Korea secretly imported nuclear bombs from the former Soviet Union in 1983 and now has four soviet-made nuclear missiles which, with a range of 8,000 km could reach the west coast of the United States. "The North Korean Army even has tens of nuclear weapons it has developed itself in addition to those made by the former Soviet Union," the General was quoted as saying.


The four nuclear-tipped missiles are stored at an underground site in Potaeri, in Samjiyon district at the foot of Mount Paekdu on the border with china, he said.


The article said the general was the "highest ranked" North Korean defector since Hwang Jang-Yop, top ideologue and secretary of the ruling workers party, was granted political asylum in South Korea in 1997.

The magazine withheld the man's name, rank and other details at his request, using the pseudonym, an Yong-Chol.


A Gendai editor told a news agency the General was aged around 60 and lives in an Asian country, and that the interview was held in mid-April. He declined to say where the interview took place. Bureau Report