“North Korean leader Kim Jong Un observed the successful test of an unspecified ‘newly developed ultramodern tactical weapon,’ state media reported Friday, in an apparent bid to apply pressure on the United States and South Korea,” the AP reports.

“It didn’t appear to be a test of a nuclear device or a long-range missile with the potential to target the U.S. A string of such tests last year had many fearing war before the North turned to engagement and diplomacy. Still, any mention of weapons testing could influence the direction of stalled diplomatic efforts spearheaded by Washington and aimed at ridding the North of its nuclear weapons.”

“The U.S. will not require North Korea to provide a complete list of its nuclear weapons and missile sites before President Donald Trump and the North’s leader Kim Jong Un meet for a second time,” Vice President Mike Pence told NBC News.

“Since an initial agreement for denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula was reached between Trump and Kim in June, the United States has pressed the North Koreans to provide information on the entirety of its nuclear operations. The Kim regime has refused to provide the details of the country’s operations and postponed scheduled meetings with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in New York City last week.”

“North Korea is moving ahead with its ballistic missile program at 16 hidden bases that have been identified in new commercial satellite images, a network long known to American intelligence agencies but left undiscussed as President Trump claims to have neutralized the North’s nuclear threat,” the New York Times reports.

“The satellite images suggest that the North has been engaged in a great deception: It has offered to dismantle a major launching site — a step it began, then halted — while continuing to make improvements at more than a dozen others that would bolster launches of conventional and nuclear warheads.”

Said Trump, just last week: “We are in no rush. The sanctions are on. The missiles have stopped. The rockets have stopped. The hostages are home.”

“The Trump administration is drastically cutting back on who on Capitol Hill gets to see intelligence reports on North Korea’s nuclear weapons program,” CBS News reports.

“Under the new rules, only each party’s House and Senate leaders, along with chairs and ranking members of foreign relations and intelligence committees, get direct access to the reports. It is a drastic change from previous distribution of North Korea related intelligence reports which, for the most part, gave access to the entire committees and the staffers on those committees.”

President Trump said that he and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un “fell in love,” The Hill reports.

Said Trump: “I was really being tough and so was he. And we would go back and forth. And then we fell in love. No really. He wrote me beautiful letters. They were great letters. And then we fell in love.”

NBC News: “North Korean leader Kim Jong Un says he plans to shut down his country’s nuclear complex, halt missile testing and cease hostile acts toward South Korea as part of a new agreement unveiled Wednesday. The pact unveiled during a joint news conference held at the end of a two-day meeting with South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Pyongyang also includes plans for the countries to host the Summer Olympics in 2032.”

But the New York Times cautions: “The offers Mr. Kim made on Wednesday … indicated that he was willing to curtail his country’s ability to produce more nuclear warheads and ICBMs. But they say little about what he will do with his existing arsenal. Mr. Kim’s ultimate goal, analysts say, is to make the Trump administration complacent enough about the recent détente to ease sanctions in return for a mere freeze — not the dismantlement — of North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs.”

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un requested a second meeting with President Trump, and U.S. diplomats are already working to set up the summit, Bloomberg reports.

“The request is the latest direct communication between the two leaders, who held a summit in Singapore in June and agreed that North Korea would abandon its nuclear weapons program. But Kim’s regime has shown little sign it’s moving toward denuclearization, and Trump canceled a planned trip to Pyongyang by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo last month citing a lack of progress.”

NBC News: “The newest intelligence shows Kim’s regime has escalated efforts to conceal its nuclear activity, according to three senior U.S. officials. During the three months since the historic Singapore summit and Trump’s proclamation that North Korea intends to denuclearize, North Korea has built structures to obscure the entrance to at least one warhead storage facility.”

“The U.S. has also observed North Korean workers moving warheads out of the facility, the officials said, though they would not speculate on where the warheads went.”

“President Trump told North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during their Singapore summit in June that he’d sign a declaration to end the Korean War soon after their meeting,” Vox reports.

“But since then, the Trump administration has repeatedly asked Pyongyang to dismantle most of its nuclear arsenal first, before signing such a document. That decision is likely what has led to the current stalemate in negotiations between the two countries — and the increasingly hostile rhetoric from North Korea.”

North Korea’s state newspaper accused the United States of “hatching a criminal plot to unleash a war against the DPRK” while “having a dialogue with a smile on its face” following a report on South Korean radio that American forces in Japan were running drills aimed at invading Pyongyang, CNN reports.

White House national security adviser John Bolton told Fox News that North Korea has not made progress toward denuclearization, in stark contrast to President Trump’s claims of an agreement with Kim Jong Un.

Said Bolton: “The United States has lived up to the Singapore declaration. It’s just North Korea that has not taken the steps we feel are necessary to denuclearize.”

A new United Nations report finds that North Korea “has not stopped its nuclear and missile programs and is violating U.N. sanctions including by ‘a massive increase in illicit ship-to-ship transfers of petroleum products,'” the AP reports.

“A summary of the report by experts monitoring U.N. sanctions against North Korea, which was sent to the Security Council Friday night… said North Korea is also violating sanctions by transferring coal at sea and flouting an arms embargo and financial sanctions.”

“Arms control experts confirm to NBC News that both satellite photos and U.S. intelligence show North Korea is continuing to produce ballistic missiles and work on its missile program, even after the historic June summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. The experts point specifically to a July 7 satellite photo that shows activity consistent with missile production.”

“U.S. spy agencies are seeing signs that North Korea is constructing new missiles at a factory that produced the country’s first intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States,” the Washington Post reports.

“Newly obtained evidence, including satellite photos taken in recent weeks, indicates that work is underway on at least one, and possibly two, liquid-fueled ICBMs at a large research facility in Sanumdong, on the outskirts of Pyongyang.”

Washington Post: “Diplomats say the North Koreans have canceled follow-up meetings, demanded more money and failed to maintain basic communications, even as the once-isolated regime’s engagements with China and South Korea flourish.”

“Meanwhile, a missile-engine testing facility that Trump said would be destroyed remains intact, and U.S. intelligence officials say Pyongyang is working to conceal key aspects of its nuclear program.”

”The lack of immediate progress, though predicted by many analysts, has frustrated the president, who has fumed at his aides in private even as he publicly hails the success of the negotiations.”

“North Korean officials didn’t show up for a planned meeting with U.S. counterparts to discuss returning the remains of American war dead… in the latest sign of tensions between the two sides,” Bloomberg reports.

“U.S. negotiators arrived Thursday at the militarized border between the two Koreas as previously announced by U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and were kept waiting,”