North Korea

Nuclear-armed state

30-40 nuclear weapons

6 nuclear tests

Has not yet joined TPNW

North Korea may be able to launch nuclear weapons from missiles. It has conducted six nuclear tests from 2006-2017.

In 2019, North Korea spent an estimated $620 million to build and maintain its nuclear weapons.

North Korea did not participate in the negotiations of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and has not yet signed or ratified it.

North Korea abstained from voting on a UN General Assembly resolution in 2019 that welcomed the adoption of the treaty and called upon “all states that have not yet done so to sign, ratify, accept, approve, or accede to the treaty at the earliest possible date”.

In October 2016, North Korea voted in the first committee of the UN General Assembly in favour of a draft resolution that ultimately established the formal mandate for states to commence the negotiations in 2017 on “a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination”.

However, it did not participate in the vote on the same resolution when it was adopted at a plenary meeting of the UN General Assembly in December 2016.

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