North Korea accelerated its nuclear and ballistic weapons programme sparking huge World War 3 fears across the globe.
The US President responded to Kim Jong-un’s threat with fiery rhetoric and warned to hit the rogue state with “fire and fury” after US territory Guam was threatened.
Speaking exclusively to Express.co.uk, Dr Lassina Zerbo, executive secretary for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO) warned about the strength of Kim Jong-un’s arsenal.
When asked about tension in the world now compared to the cold war, Mr Zerbo highlighted how quickly North Korea had been able to develop weapons.
He said: “I think the cold war had its time. Here we are dealing with a different period of technology has evolved, nuclear tests are much bigger and larger than anything that we have ever seen.
“And what has been surprising for the Korean peninsula for DPRK is the speed at which they developed the capability.
“I think if you take what has happened in the past, it took some of the countries much more time to be at this stage of development of nuclear weapon in terms of testing than what we have seen with the Korean.”
Mr Zerbo called for nuclear testing to be banned in the Korean peninsula and across the world, but the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty to ban nuclear explosions, which has been signed by 183 countries and ratified by 166 countries, is yet to be passed.
Thirteen countries including North Korea has neither signed nor ratified. Another seventeen countries including Iran, China, Israel and the US has signed but not ratified.
The warnings from Dr Zerbo come as the CTBTO monitors the globe for evidence of nuclear tests and reported when 200 North Koreans were killed when a tunnel collapsed in October caused by nuclear testing in September.
North Korea’s most recent missile test took place on November 29, and the regime said the Hwasong-15 missile flew 590 miles during its 53-minute flight before landing in the sea new Japan.
After the missile test Kim Jong-un declared that the North had “finally realised the great historic cause of completing the state nuclear force”.
The US President has promised to “take care” of the situation is a huge warning to Kim Jong-un, which heightened World War 3 fears.
He said: “This situation should have been taken care of long before I got into office when it was much easier to handle. But it will be taken care of. We have no choice.
“Our campaign of maximum pressure on the North Korean regime has resulted in the toughest ever sanctions. We have united our allies in an unprecedented effort to isolate North Korea, however, there is much more work to do.
“America and its allies will take all necessary steps to achieve a denuclearisation and ensure that this regime cannot threaten the world.”
The United Nations Security Council has now imposed tough new sanctions on North Korea after its continued missile testing.
The resolution seeks to ban nearly 90 percent of refined petroleum product exports to North Korea.
The North Korea foreign ministry responded to the UN sanctions and branded them an “act of war”.