Monthly Archives: May 2009

North Korea: Underground Nuclear Test Successful

Diplomats around the globe are spazzing out and drafting meaningless letters of condemnation:

North Korea state media said the country’s military conducted a successful underground nuclear test early Monday, confirming earlier reports of a suspected test based on seismic data.

The news triggered an emergency security meeting among South Korea officials and forced a temporary halt to trading on South Korea’s main stock market.

News reports cited North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency as saying the nation had “successfully conducted another underground nuclear test on May 25 as part of its measures aimed at strengthening its self-defense nuclear deterrent in every way.”

South Korean officials said earlier that it suspected a nuclear test had taken place after detecting an “artificial earthquake.”

The U.S. Geological Survey reported an earthquake of magnitude of 4.7 on the Richter scale, centered about 230 miles northeast of Pyongyang. The epicenter is in the same area where North Korea conducted its previous nuclear test in October 2006.

Major Phil Packer Completes London Marathon

It took two painful weeks:

After he was presented with his marathon medal on completion of the 26.2 mile course by Olympic legend Sir Steve Redgrave, after two painstaking weeks on crutches to complete the London course, he insisted that the support had been “overwhelming” all the way. The Royal Military Police Officer, who suffered catastrophic injuries during a rocket attack in Basra, Iraq, in February 2008, will return to duty with the army in July, but revealed that “a real interest has opened up in me about disability sport. I now feel a part of two families, the army, and the disability community. I have been developing an idea, and it is still only an idea, of perhaps helping to develop disability sport across the army.”

You can support Major Packer’s fund raising efforts at www.philpacker.com.