IAEA warns North Korea nuclear arsenal 'moving quite fast'

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director general Rafael Grossi warned on April 23, 2026, that North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme is moving quickly and poses a growing threat to global stability, according to an interview published in The Telegraph.

Grossi expressed concern that the United Nations lacks proper visibility into North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme, which has progressed swiftly in recent years despite enduring international sanctions. “I think it’s fair to say that we see North Korea as a clear expansion. What we see is that the country is moving quite fast in this area and as you know, although this is not nuclear, but it is intrinsically related, you have a very ambitious ballistic missile programme,” Grossi told The Telegraph.

North Korea’s Weapons Development

North Korea’s state-controlled Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) announced in February that under Kim Jong Un’s leadership the country “radically improved” its “war deterrence”, “with the nuclear forces as its pivot”, according to reports cited in the source.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimated last year that North Korea possessed around 50 nuclear warheads and had enough material to produce up to 40 more.

Recent Ballistic Missile Tests

North Korea announced it test-fired ballistic missiles equipped with cluster bomb warheads on Sunday in the second such trial that month. The KCNA report referenced multiple launches spotted on Sunday off North Korea’s eastern coastline by South Korea, Japan and the United States.

Kim Jong Un supervised the firing of five enhanced surface-to-surface Hwasong-11 Ra ballistic missiles fitted with cluster bomb warheads and fragmentation mine warheads, KCNA reported. The missiles hit an island target and Kim voiced approval over the launches, declaring “It is of weighty significance in military actions to boost the high-density striking capability,” according to the outlet.

KCNA photographs depicted North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his teenage daughter, both donning black leather jackets, observing from a coastal vantage point as a projectile flew over the waters, leaving grey smoke in its wake. South Korea’s intelligence agency recently concluded that the daughter, allegedly named Kim Ju Ae, might be regarded as Kim’s successor.

International Treaty Context

Over 120 nations have endorsed an international agreement prohibiting the deployment of cluster munitions, but North Korea, Iran, Israel and the US are not amongst them.

Meanwhile, 191 nations have signed the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), with key signatories including the five acknowledged nuclear-weapon states - the US, Russia, the UK, France, and China. The NPT does not extend to the nuclear-armed countries of India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea. According to the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, of the world’s over 12,300 nuclear warheads, Russia possesses 5,459, the US has 5,277 and the UK holds 225.