NEW DELHI, June 16 (NNN-BERNAMA) — India and Pakistan have 310 nuclear weapons but their combined arsenal is smaller than Asia’s foremost military power, China.
The nine nuclear-armed states, including the United States, Russia, Britain, France, Israel and North Korea, together possessed an estimated 13,400 nuclear weapons at the start of 2020 compared with 13,865 a year before, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said on Monday.
The decrease in the overall number of nuclear weapons in 2019 was largely due to the elimination of retired nuclear weapons by Russia and the US, which together possess more than 90 per cent of global nuclear weapons, it said.
India has 150 nuclear warheads, Pakistan 160 and China possesses 320 weapons, the Swedish arms watchdog said.
China’s arsenal grew by 30, while India and Pakistan increased theirs by 10 each within a year.
“China is in the middle of a significant modernisation of its nuclear arsenal. It is developing a so-called nuclear triad for the first time, made up of new land- and sea-based missiles and nuclear-capable aircraft. India and Pakistan are slowly increasing the size and diversity of their nuclear forces, while North Korea continues to prioritise its military nuclear programme as a central element of its national security strategy,” SIPRI said.
Israel is estimated to have 90 nuclear weapons compared with 80 in 2019 and North Korea has increased the number of warheads to 30-40 from last year’s estimate of 20-30.
Russia possesses 6,375 warheads, the US stockpile totals 5,800, Britain controls 215 and France has 290 devices.
— NNN-BERNAMA
