North Korea destroys nuke test site

North Korea carried out what it said was the demolition of its nuclear test site, setting off a series of explosions over several hours in the presence of foreign journalists.

The blasts at the test site in the sparsely populated northeast were supposed to build confidence ahead of a planned summit next month between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump. But Trump canceled the meeting on Thursday, citing the "tremendous anger and open hostility" in a North Korean statement released earlier in the day.

The explosions were centered on three tunnels into the underground site and a number of observation towers in the surrounding area. North Korea held a closing ceremony afterward with officials from its nuclear arms program in attendance. The group of journalists that witnessed the demolition, which touched off landslides near the tunnel entrances and sent up clouds of smoke and dust, included an Associated Press Television crew. 

 North Korea's state media called the closure of the site part of a process to build "a nuclear-free, peaceful world" and "global nuclear disarmament." But even as North Korea made good on its gesture of detente, it lobbed a verbal salvo at Washington, calling Vice President Mike Pence a "political dummy" and saying it is just as ready to meet in a nuclear confrontation as at the negotiating table. Trump responded by canceling the summit, saying in a letter to Kim: "Sadly, based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement, I feel it is inappropriate, at this time, to have this long-planned meeting." North Korea's decision to close the Punggye-ri nuclear test site had generally been seen as a welcome gesture to set a positive tone ahead of the summit. In a statement earlier Thursday, South Korea's National Security Council called it the North's "first measure toward complete denuclearization." Not everyone was as optimistic, however.

The closing of the site is not an irreversible move and would need to be followed by many more significant measures to meet Trump's demand for real denuclearization. North Korea also did not invite international nuclear weapons inspectors, opting instead for the impact of the television footage to impress the world.