A detection station for seismic activity at Bilibion, a remote corner of Russia.
The Official CTBTO Photostream (Copyright CTBTO Preparatory Commission)
Human-induced earthquakes have been reported from every continent except Antarctica. We asked a geologist to investigate whether North Korea’s nuclear tests could trigger geological changes.
North Korea’s legitimacy derives almost wholly from its subjects’ perception of perfect strength and resolve. This makes it harder for Pyongyang to back down.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping speaks at the BRICS summit in Xiamen.
Reuters
China is probably no more fond of the North Korean regime than the Americans are, but it is walking a fine line between managing both nations and ensuring its own continued rise.
Boeing WC-135 Constant Phoenix “sniffer plane” used to monitor radioactive emissions from nuclear bomb tests.
US Air Force/Staff Sgt. Christopher Boitz
The international community – and the U.S. and China in particular – should give serious thought to what might be North Korea’s cyberattack equivalent of a nuclear weapons test.
In the summer of 1946, the U.S. government detonated the first of many atomic bomb tests in the Marshall Islands. Seventy years of radiation exposure later, residents are still fighting for justice.
If this detonation was a hydrogen bomb test, then it was likely less successful than the North Korean leadership may have hoped.
Reuters/Kim Hong-Ji
North Korea remains committed to perfecting a deployable nuclear weapon capability. It is confident in the understanding that there appears little the international community can do to prevent it.
A nuclear test explosion from April 1954.
File photo/Reuters
A number of states have given up on pursuing nuclear disarmament through the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Instead they are moving to create a new legal mechanism for banning nuclear weapons
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been feted during his visit, but there are no guarantees that his new uranium deal with Australia won’t worsen nuclear security.
AAP Image/Tracey Nearmy
Behind the flag-waving and cheers surrounding Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to Australia are serious questions about the safety and security implications of Australia’s agreement to…
Predicting or worrying about disasters is a popular pastime. But we tend to take notice when somebody with money at stake becomes concerned. Financial people likely sat up when Paul Singer, manager of…
Terrible beauty: Operation Castle – British test on Bikini Atoll, March 1954.
Wikimedia Commons
It was a key moment in the Cold War: 50 years ago, on August 5, 1963, US and the Soviet Union signed the Limited Test Ban Treaty banning nuclear tests in the atmosphere, underwater and in outer space (but…
The Vixen B tests at Maralinga were kept quiet for decades: why did no one ask what was going on?
Wayne England
Occasionally I give guest lectures to undergraduates about Maralinga. In most cases, the students have never heard of the place. A small number may have heard the word, but don’t know what it means. This…