US analysts ID 13 secret North Korean missile sites: report

By MATTHEW LEE, AP DIPLOMATIC WRITER WASHINGTON — Nov 12, 2018, 1:16 PM ET

U.S. analysts said Monday they have located more than half of an estimated 20 secret North Korean missile development sites, highlighting the challenge the Trump administration faces in ensuring that North Korea complies with any eventual agreement to end its nuclear and missile programs.

The findings, which were released amid signs the administration's negotiations with the North have stalled, draw on commercial satellite imagery and identify 13 secret facilities used to produce missiles and related technology. They suggest that Pyongyang is continuing its missile work, even though it has halted test launches in what President Donald Trump and his administration have claimed as a success since his historic June meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore.

Although the sites are not launch facilities and in some cases are rudimentary, the authors of the report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies say they are hidden and illustrate the scope of the North's weapons program and the country's determination to conceal its military might.

"The dispersed deployment of these bases and distinctive tactics employed by ballistic missile units are combined with decades of extensive camouflage, concealment and deception practices to maximize the survival of its missile units from pre-emptive strikes and during wartime operations," they said.

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