Tag Archives: Kim Jong-un

Trump says Pompeo en route to North Korea, cites hopes on U.S. detainees

FILE PHOTO: U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo listens to remarks made by President Donald Trump during Pompeo's swearing-in ceremony at the Department of State in Washington, U.S., May 2, 2018. REUTERS/Leah Millis

By Matt Spetalnick and Lesley Wroughton

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump revealed on Tuesday that U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was on his way to Pyongyang to prepare for Trump’s summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and expressed hope that three Americans held there would soon be released.

Trump said Pompeo, making his second visit to North Korea in less than six weeks, was expected to arrive “very shortly” and that the two countries had already agreed on a date and location for the unprecedented summit, though he stopped short of providing details.

While Trump said it would be a “great thing” if the three American detainees were freed, Pompeo, speaking to reporters en route to Pyongyang, said he had not received a commitment for their release but hoped North Korea would “do the right thing.”

Their release could signal an effort by Kim to set a more positive tone for the summit following his recent pledge to suspend missile tests and shut Pyongyang’s nuclear bomb test site.

While Kim would be giving up the last of his remaining American prisoners, whom North Korea has often used in the past as bargaining chips with the United States, a release could also be aimed at pressuring Trump to make concessions of his own in his bid to get Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear arsenal, something it has not signaled a willingness to do.

“Plans are being made, relationships are building,” Trump said of the planned summit during remarks at the White House that were otherwise focused on his decision to pull the United States out of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.

“Hopefully, a deal will happen. And with the help of China, South Korea and Japan, a future of great prosperity and security can be achieved for everyone,” Trump added.

Pompeo made a secret visit to North Korea over the Easter weekend, becoming the first U.S. official known to have met Kim, to lay the groundwork for the planned summit. The meeting occurred before Pompeo’s nomination as secretary of state had been confirmed.

Trump suggested that dropping out of the Iran nuclear accord, which he has frequently denounced as a bad deal for the United States, would send a “critical message” not just to Tehran but also to Pyongyang. He has demanded that North Korea agree to give up its nuclear arsenal.

“The United States no longer makes empty threats. When I make promises, I keep them,” Trump said.

FATE OF THREE DETAINEES IN PLAY

Pompeo’s latest trip raised the prospects that the three Korean-American detainees – Kim Hak-song, Tony Kim and Kim Dong-chul – could be turned over to him.

Asked whether that could happen, Trump told reporters: “We’ll all soon be finding out. We’ll soon be finding out. It would be a great thing if they are.”

“We’ve been asking for the release of these detainees for 17 months,” Pompeo said. “We’ll talk about it again. It’d be a great gesture if they’d agree to do so.”

Pompeo said he was hoping to finalize the agenda for the summit. He met Kim on this last trip but said he did not know exactly who he would meet this time.

Pompeo said he hoped to be able to outline a set of conditions that would create the opportunity for a historic change in the security relationship with North Korea and added that sanctions would not be lifted until U.S. objectives were met.

“We are not going to head down the path we headed down before,” he said. “We will not relieve sanctions until such time as we have achieved our objectives.”

Pompeo’s latest visit followed talks between Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in met on April 27 at the heavily fortified demilitarized zone between the countries, the first summit for the two Koreas in over a decade.

The North-South summit produced dramatic images and a declaration of goodwill. But it was short on specific commitments and failed to clear up the question of whether Pyongyang is really willing to give up nuclear missiles that now threaten the United States.

U.S. officials have been pressing Kim to free the three remaining American detainees as a gesture of sincerity before the summit, the first-ever meeting of sitting U.S. and North Korean leaders. Trump and Kim have exchanged insults and threats over the past year but tensions have eased in recent months.

Until now, the only American released by North Korea during Trump’s presidency was Otto Warmbier, a 22-year-old university student who returned to the United States in a coma last summer after 17 months of captivity and died days later.

Warmbier’s death escalated U.S.-North Korea tensions, already running high at the time over Pyongyang’s stepped-up missile tests.

The three still being held are Korean-American missionary Kim Dong Chul; Kim Sang-duk, who spent a month teaching at the foreign-funded Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) before he was arrested in 2017, and Kim Hak Song, who also taught at PUST.

(Reporting by Matt Spetalnick, David Brunnstrom, David Alexander and John Walcott; Editing by Leslie Adler and James Dalgleish)

South Korean trust in North jumps after feel-good summit

South Korean President Moon Jae-in shakes hands with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as Kim leaves after a farewell ceremony at the truce village of Panmunjom inside the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas, South Korea, April 27, 2018. Korea Summit Press Pool/Pool via Reuters

By Hyonhee Shin and Haejin Choi

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean trust in North Korea has surged since last week’s feel-good summit at which their leaders declared an end to hostilities and to work towards denuclearization of the peninsula.

A survey taken on Friday, the day North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met South Korean President Moon Jae-in, showed 64.7 percent believe the North will denuclearize and keep peace. Before the summit, only 14.7 percent of those polled said they did, research agency Realmeter said on Monday.

Many South Koreans were struck by the live TV images during the summit of a smiling and joking Kim. Never before had they seen a self-deprecating and witty side to him, admitting that his country’s train system was inferior and promising he wouldn’t wake up Moon any more with early morning missile launches.

Kim seemed markedly different from former North Korean leaders – his father Kim Jong Il and grandfather Kim Il Sung, people on the street in Seoul said on Monday.

“Denuclearizing is definitely possible,” said 41-year-old Kim Jin-han. The North Korean leader “talked about his country’s weaknesses, such as the infrastructure. He was very open about that. This is very different from the previous leaders. So I think he is ready to wholly give up nuclear weapons.”

Kim’s comments about bringing Pyongyang-style cold noodles to the summit banquet clearly captivated many in the South, prompting some to add his face to the photo of a popular app for a food delivery service, holding a bowl of noodles under his arm.

One social media post getting attention said that with a successful summit, South Korea should brace for an onslaught of North Korean beer as the first wave of “cultural aggression”. A parody showed a South Korean news announcer reporting that Kim complaining about watery South Korean beer compared to Taedonggang Beer featured in the background.

South Korea’s stock market got a boost on Monday, lifted by shares of construction companies and train and steel manufacturers on hopes for joint economic projects.

NEXT SUMMIT

A euphoric mood also enveloped the presidential Blue House on Monday as Moon was greeted by cheers and a standing ovation by scores of aides and staff.

“I am confident a new era of peace will unfold on the Korean peninsula,” Moon told his aides, asking them to quickly follow up on the agreements made in Friday’s declaration.

The two sides are technically still at war since their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a treaty.

Moon’s approval rating after the summit rose to 70 percent, Realmeter said, its highest since mid-January.

Moon also told aides that U.S. President Donald Trump deserved the Nobel Peace Prize for helping to end the standoff with North Korea over its nuclear weapons program, a South Korean official said.

“President Trump should win the Nobel Peace Prize. What we need is only peace,” Moon told aides, according to a Blue House official who briefed the press.

In January, Moon had said Trump “deserves big credit” for bringing about the inter-Korean talks, saying it may have come from “U.S.-led sanctions and pressure.”

Friday’s final declaration, however, leaves many questions unanswered, particularly what “denuclearization” means or how that will be achieved. Much hinges on Kim’s upcoming summit with Trump, who said it could happen in the next three to four weeks.

Any deal with the United States will require that North Korea demonstrate “irreversible” steps to shutting down its nuclear weapons program, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Sunday.

A flurry of diplomacy is unfolding in the lead-up to that meeting, with China saying it will send the government’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, to North Korea on Wednesday and Thursday this week. China is the North’s main ally.

And over the weekend, South Korea’s spy chief visited Tokyo to brief Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

NO MORE SPEAKERS

In initial small steps towards reconciliation, South Korea said on Monday it would remove loudspeakers that blared propaganda across the border, while North Korea said it would shift its clocks to align with its southern neighbor.

South Korea turned off the loudspeakers that broadcast a mixture of news, Korean pop songs and criticism of the North Korean regime as a goodwill gesture ahead of the summit. It will begin removing the speakers on Tuesday.

“We see this as the easiest first step to build military trust,” South Korean defense ministry spokeswoman Choi Hyun-soo said. “We are expecting the North’s implementation.”

North Korea will shift its time zone 30 minutes earlier to align with South Korea, starting May 5, state media reported on Monday.

The KCNA dispatch said the decision came after Kim found it “a painful wrench” to see two clocks showing different times on a wall at the summit venue.

The northern time zone was created in 2015 to mark the 70th anniversary of Korea’s liberation from Japanese rule after World War Two. South Korea and Japan are in the same time zone, nine hours ahead of Greenwich Mean Time.

Kim also told Moon during the summit he would soon invite experts and journalists from the United States and South Korea when the country dismantles its Punggye-ri nuclear testing site, the Blue House said on Sunday.

North Korea has conducted all six of its nuclear tests at the site, a series of tunnels dug into the mountains in the northeastern part of the country. Some experts and researchers have speculated that the most recent – and by far largest – blast in September had rendered the entire site unusable.

But Kim said there were two additional, larger tunnels that remain “in very good condition” beyond the existing one, which experts believe may have collapsed.

(Additional reporting by Ju-min Park in SEOUL and Matthew Miller in BEIJING. Writing by Malcolm Foster. Editing by Lincoln Feast and Nick Macfie)

North Korea tells U.S. it is prepared to discuss denuclearization: source

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un watches the launch of a Hwasong-12 missile in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on September 16, 2017. KCNA via REUTERS

By Matt Spetalnick and David Brunnstrom

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – North Korea has told the United States for the first time that it is prepared to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula when North Korean leader Kim Jong Un meets President Donald Trump, a U.S. official said on Sunday.

U.S. and North Korean officials have held secret contacts recently in which Pyongyang directly confirmed its willingness to hold the unprecedented summit, the official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The communications, still at a preliminary stage, have involved State Department officials talking to North Korea apparently through its United Nations mission, and intelligence officers from both sides using a separate backchannel, the official said.

Until now, the United States had relied mostly on ally South Korea’s assurance of Kim’s intentions.

South Korean envoys visited Washington last month to convey Kim’s invitation to meet. Trump, who has exchanged bellicose threats with Kim in the past year, surprised the world by quickly agreeing to meet Kim to discuss the crisis over Pyongyang’s development of nuclear weapons capable of hitting the United States.

But North Korea has not broken its public silence on the summit, which U.S. officials say is being planned for May. There was no immediate word on the possible venue for the talks, which would be the first ever between a sitting U.S. president and North Korean leader.

The U.S. official declined to say exactly when the U.S.-North Korea communications had taken place but said the two sides had held multiple direct contacts.

“The U.S. has confirmed that Kim Jong Un is willing to discuss the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula‎,” said a second U.S. official.

South Korea’s presidential Blue House welcomed the communication between North Korea and the United States, with one official saying the development was “positive”.

“We are aware contact between North Korea and the United States is going well,” said another Blue House official on condition of anonymity.

“We don’t know, however, up to what extent information is being shared between the two.”

On Monday, former U.N. ambassador John Bolton is due to begin his role as Trump’s national security adviser, while on Thursday Senate confirmation hearings begin for Mike Pompeo, Trump’s nominee for secretary of state. Both have taken hawkish stances on North Korea.

The second South Korean official said the South’s National Security Office head, Chung Eui-yong, could speak with Bolton over the telephone as early as Tuesday.

Questions remain about how North Korea would define denuclearization, which Washington sees as Pyongyang abandoning its nuclear weapons program.

North Korea has said over the years that it could consider giving up its nuclear arsenal if the United States removed its troops from South Korea and withdrew its so-called nuclear umbrella of deterrence from South Korea and Japan.

Some analysts have said Trump’s willingness to meet Kim handed North Korea a diplomatic win, as the United States had insisted for years that any such summit be preceded by North Korean steps to denuclearize.

Tension over North Korea’s tests of nuclear weapons and ballistic missile surged last year and raised fears of U.S. military action against Pyongyang.

But anxieties have eased significantly since North Korea sent athletes to the Winter Olympics in South Korea in February. The neighbors are technically still at war after a 1950-53 conflict ended with a ceasefire, not a truce.

North and South Korea will hold their first summit in more than a decade towards the end of April.

The two Koreas have been holding working talks since March to work out details of the summit, like the agenda and security for the two leaders.

Kim met Chinese President Xi Jinping in a surprise visit to Beijing in late March, his first trip outside the isolated North Korea since he came to power in 2011.

(Reporting by Matt Spetalnick and David Brunnstromm; Additional reporting by Christine Kim in SEOUL; Editing by Peter Cooney and Rosalba O’Brien)

Secrecy, delays surrounded North Korea leader’s slow train to China

FILE PHOTO: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un waves from a train, as he paid an unofficial visit to China, in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang March 28, 2018. KCNA/via Reuters/File Photo

By Brenda Goh and Sue-Lin Wong

SHANGHAI/BEIJING (Reuters) – For a regime obsessed with secrecy, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s decision to travel to Beijing on a distinctive green armored train was an all-but-dead giveaway that he was making his first journey abroad since assuming power in 2011.

The historic visit sent officials scrambling to obscure the identity of the 21-car train and its occupants as it meandered across roughly 1,100 km (680 miles) of track through northeast China, causing rare delays along the way and triggering a growing frenzy of speculation as it neared the Chinese capital.

The train arrived at Beijing Station on Monday afternoon and left the following afternoon, with the identity of its occupants only announced on Wednesday morning – after it had crossed back into North Korea at the city of Sinuiju.

Clues that something unusual was afoot emerged in the border city of Dandong, just across the Yalu River from North Korea and linked to the isolated country by the Sino-Korea Friendship Bridge. That bridge bears a single rail track which, it turned out, carried Kim’s train into China late on Sunday.

The Daily NK, a Seoul-based website staffed by North Korean defectors, reported that boards supported by scaffolding had been set up on the platform at Dandong’s train station, blocking what is ordinarily an open view, before two trains passed through the station between 10:20 and 10:40 p.m. on Sunday night.

Yao Jun, who sells car parts in Dandong, said the station was locked down again on Tuesday night, an unusual occurrence. Kim returned to North Korea in the early hours of Wednesday.

“Now we know for next time – if the train station is in lockdown then that means Kim Jong Un has come to China,” Yao told Reuters.

At least one Dandong hotel was told by Chinese authorities not to book rooms facing the bridge, while tours from China into the North were canceled on Sunday, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters. A local resident said that a wedding party along the river on Sunday had been told not to set off firecrackers.

By Monday morning sighting rumors and pictures were making the rounds on Chinese social media, before being blocked or deleted by censors, while railway bureaus began warning travelers to expect delays or cancellations on Monday and Tuesday.

The disruptions were noteworthy in a country with a vast rail network that prides itself on its efficiency, with 98.8 percent of trains departing on time in 2016 and 95.4 percent arriving on schedule, and prompted complaints online.

Zhao Jian, a professor at Beijing Jiaotong University who researches the country’s railway system, said Kim’s train traveled on the regular track network, rather than on the tracks used by the country’s high-speed trains.

“Passenger and freight traffic would have been affected,” he said.

A person answering the official phone line at Dandong station on Thursday stressed that everything had been “normal” this week, and asked, “who told you the station was closed?”

An official in the international cooperation department of the China Railway Corporation declined immediate comment on Kim’s visit.

MANCHURIA AND THE GREAT WALL

China has not disclosed the route taken by Kim in the train – green with a yellow stripe resembling one used by his late father, Kim Jong Il, on his last visit to China in 2011.

Based on photos from the elder Kim’s visit, the only visible difference between the two trains was a license plate. The younger Kim’s license plate showed DF0002; the plate on the train used by his father displayed DF0001.

North Korean state media showed Kim and his entourage, including his wife Ri Sol Ju, seated on stuffed pink sofas inside the train carriage with Song Tao, the head of the Chinese Communist Party’s international affairs department, during their inbound stop in Dandong.

There are at least two likely rail routes between Dandong and Beijing, and an ordinary service takes at least 14 hours, according to Chinese railway timetables. The route is also covered by China’s high-speed trains, which travel on separate tracks, in just over six hours.

But social media posts made by local railway bureaus and ordinary users on social media suggest a surge in delays around the route from Dandong that heads north to Shenyang, in the region previously known as Manchuria. The route then snakes west along the Hebei province coast towards Beijing.

On Monday morning, Weibo users at rail stations in Tangshan and Tianjin began complaining of unexpected cancellations to regular services bound for Beijing, which they said were made without explanation.

In a Weibo post published at 5:14 p.m. on Monday and since deleted, the Beijing Railway Bureau told travelers waiting at stations in Beijing, Tianjin and Shijiazhuang to expect delays of up to two hours for trains from Shenyang and Qinhuangdao.

On Tuesday evening, a Twitter user with the handle “2018you333” posted a grainy video of a train with a single horizontal stripe hurtling across an empty car underpass, which the user said was taken at the Shanhai Pass area, 300 km east of Beijing and a major pass in the Great Wall of China.

“Let’s guess where this distinguished guest is coming from!”, the post said.

Reuters was unable to verify the authenticity of the video.

(Additional reporting by Michael Martina, Philip Wen and the Shanghai and Beijing newsrooms; Editing by Tony Munroe and Alex Richardson)

Trump gives positive sign on talks with Kim, good review of Xi meeting

FILE PHOTO - A combination photo shows a Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) handout of Kim Jong Un released on May 10, 2016, and Donald Trump posing for a photo in New York City, U.S., May 17, 2016. REUTERS/KCNA handout via Reuters/File Photo & REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un looked forward to meeting with him, indicating the planned landmark talks between the isolated Asian leader and Republican president will go forward.

“Received message last night from XI JINPING of China that his meeting with KIM JONG UN went very well and that KIM looks forward to his meeting with me,” Trump said on Twitter. “In the meantime, and unfortunately, maximum sanctions and pressure must be maintained at all cost!”

Trump also tweeted: “Look forward to our meeting!”

After two days of speculation, China announced on Wednesday that Kim had visited Beijing and met Xi, who elicited a pledge from Kim to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.

The trip was Kim’s first known journey abroad since he assumed power in 2011 and is believed by analysts to serve as preparation for upcoming summits with South Korea and the United States.

The White House said on Tuesday that China briefed Trump on the meetings and that the denuclearization pledge was “further evidence that our campaign of maximum pressure is creating the appropriate atmosphere for dialogue with North Korea.”

“For years and through many administrations, everyone said that peace and the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula was not even a small possibility,” Trump tweeted on Wednesday. “Now there is a good chance that Kim Jong Un will do what is right for his people and for humanity.”

Earlier this month, Trump surprised the world by agreeing to meet Kim at a place and time to be determined. South Korea’s national security chief said the first-ever meeting between U.S. and North Korean presidents would take place in May but details of potential talks have not been made public and the White House has said they will only happen if North Korea keeps “several promises.”

(Reporting by Lisa Lambert; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Bill Trott)

China says North Korea’s Kim pledged commitment to denuclearization

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping, in this still image taken from video released on March 28, 2018. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visited China from Sunday to Wednesday on an unofficial visit, China's state news agency Xinhua reported on Wednesday. CCTV via Reuters TV

By Ben Blanchard and Joyce Lee

BEIJING/SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un pledged his commitment to denuclearization and to meet U.S. officials, China said on Wednesday after his meeting with President Xi Jinping, who promised China would uphold friendship with its isolated neighbor.

After two days of speculation, China and North Korea both confirmed that Kim had traveled to Beijing and met Xi during what China called an unofficial visit from Sunday to Wednesday.

The visit was Kim’s first known trip outside North Korea since he assumed power in 2011 and is believed by analysts to serve as preparation for upcoming summits with South Korea and the United States.

North Korea’s KCNA news agency made no mention of Kim’s pledge to denuclearize, or his anticipated meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump that is planned for some time in May.

China has traditionally been secretive North Korea’s closest ally but ties have been frayed by its pursuit of nuclear weapons and China’s backing of tough U.N. sanctions in response.

China’s Foreign Ministry cited Kim in a lengthy statement as telling Xi the situation on the Korean peninsula was starting to improve because North Korea had taken the initiative to ease tension and put forward proposals for talks.

“It is our consistent stand to be committed to denuclearization on the peninsula, in accordance with the will of late President Kim Il Sung and late General Secretary Kim Jong Il,” Kim Jong Un said, according to the ministry.

North Korea was willing to talk with the United States and hold a summit between the two countries, he said.

“The issue of denuclearization of the Korean peninsula can be resolved, if South Korea and the United States respond to our efforts with goodwill, create an atmosphere of peace and stability while taking progressive and synchronous measures for the realization of peace,” Kim said.

‘NUCLEAR UMBRELLA’

Kim Jong Un’s predecessors, grandfather Kim Il Sung and father Kim Jong Il, both promised not to pursue nuclear weapons but secretly maintained programs to develop them, culminating in the North’s first nuclear test in 2006 under Kim Jong Il.

The North had said in previous, failed talks aimed at dismantling its nuclear program it could consider giving up its arsenal if the United States removed its troops from South Korea and withdrew its so-called nuclear umbrella of deterrence from South Korea and Japan.

Many analysts and former negotiators believe this still constitutes North Korea’s stance and remain deeply skeptical Kim is willing to give up the weapons his family has been developing for decades.

At first wrapped in secrecy, the announcement of Kim Jong Un’s visit soon became the third-most discussed topic on China’s Weibo microblogging site, although many state media outlets blocked their comments sections.

Widely read Chinese state-run newspaper the Global Times praised the meeting as proving naysayers wrong about Beijing-Pyongyang relations.

“China and North Korea maintaining their friendly relations provides a positive force for the whole region and promotes strategic stability in northeast Asia,” it said in an editorial.

Kim’s appearance in Beijing involved almost all the trappings of a state visit, complete with an honor guard and banquet at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People.

Kim and Xi also met at the Diaoyutai State Guest House, where Kim Il Sung planted a tree in 1959 that still stands.

State television showed pictures of the two men chatting and Kim’s wife, Ri Sol Ju, getting a warm welcome from Xi’s wife, Peng Liyuan.

TRUMP BRIEFED

China briefed Trump on Kim’s visit and the communication included a personal message from Xi to Trump, the White House said in a statement.

“The United States remains in close contact with our allies South Korea and Japan. We see this development as further evidence that our campaign of maximum pressure is creating the appropriate atmosphere for dialogue with North Korea,” it said.

Analysts said the meeting strengthened North Korea’s position ahead of any meeting with Trump by aligning Beijing and Pyongyang while reassuring China it was not being sidelined in any negotiations.

“It seems that North Korea is not ready to deal with the United States without support and help from its longtime ally China,” said Han Suk-hee, professor of Chinese Studies at South Korea’s Yonsei University.

A top Chinese diplomat, Politburo member Yang Jiechi, will brief officials, including President Moon Jae-in, in Seoul on Thursday about the Beijing talks, the presidential office in Seoul said.

Kim told a banquet hosted by Xi the visit was intended to “maintain our great friendship and continue and develop our bilateral ties at a time of rapid developments on the Korean peninsula”, according to KCNA.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and wife Ri Sol Ju, and Chinese President Xi Jinping and wife Peng Liyuan meet, as Kim Jong Un paid an unofficial visit to Beijing, China, in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang March 28, 2018. KCNA/via Reuters

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and wife Ri Sol Ju, and Chinese President Xi Jinping and wife Peng Liyuan meet, as Kim Jong Un paid an unofficial visit to Beijing, China, in this undated photo released by North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang March 28, 2018. KCNA/via Reuters

Xi had accepted an invitation “with pleasure” from him to visit North Korea, KCNA said.

China made no mention of Xi accepting an invitation, but Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang pointed to a line in their statement citing Xi as saying he is willing to maintain regular communications with North Korea via visits and exchanges of envoys and messages.

“I have to say that China and North Korea have a tradition of high-level mutual visits,” Lu told a daily news briefing.

China had largely sat on the sidelines as North Korea improved relations with South Korea recently, raising worry in Beijing that it was no longer a central player in the North Korean issue, reinforced by Trump’s subsequent announcement of his proposed meeting with Kim Jong Un in May.

“China is North Korea’s lifeline, so the notion, from a Chinese perspective, that Kim Jong Un could have had these other two meetings before meeting with Xi Jinping, I think the Chinese just thought that is not going to happen,” said Paul Haenle, director of the Carnegie–Tsinghua Center in Beijing and the former White House representative to North Korea denuclearization talks from 2007-2009.

(Additional reporting by Christine Kim and Soyoung Kim in SEOUL, David Stanway and John Ruwitch in SHANGHAI and Ayesha Rascoe in WASHINGTON; Writing by Lincoln Feast; Editing by Paul Tait, Robert Birsel)

South Korea’s Moon says three-way summit with North Korea, U.S. possible

FILE PHOTO: South Korean President Moon Jae-in delivers a speech during a ceremony celebrating the 99th anniversary of the March First Independence Movement against Japanese colonial rule, at Seodaemun Prison History Hall in Seoul, South Korea, March 1, 2018. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

By Hyonhee Shin and Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean President Moon Jae-in said on Wednesday a three-way summit with North Korea and the United States is possible and that talks should aim for an end to the nuclear threat on the Korean peninsula.

Moon is planning a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un next month after a flurry of diplomatic activity in Asia, Europe and the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump has also said he would meet Kim by the end of May.

“A North Korea-U.S. summit would be a historic event in itself following an inter-Korean summit,” Moon said at the presidential Blue House in Seoul after a preparatory meeting for the inter-Korean summit.

“Depending on the location, it could be even more dramatic. And depending on progress, it may lead to a three-way summit between the South, North and the United States,” he said.

Seoul officials are considering the border truce village of Panmunjom, where Moon and Kim are set for a one-day meeting, as the venue for talks between not only Kim and Moon but also a possible three-way meeting.

A Blue House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Moon did not specifically refer to Panmunjom or that a three-way summit had been discussed with Washington before the president spoke.

The rush of recent diplomatic contacts began in the lead-up to the Winter Olympics in South Korea last month and helped ease tensions on the Korean peninsula caused by North Korea’s pursuit of its nuclear and missile programs in defiance of United Nations Security Council sanctions.

South Korea wants to hold high-level talks with North Korea on March 29 to discuss a date and agenda for the inter-Korean summit and make a formal request to the North on Thursday, Moon’s presidential office said.

North and South Korean officials should be able to agree on when the summit between Moon and Kim will take place once the officials from both sides meet this month, the Blue House official said.

‘CLEAR GOAL’

Moon said the series of summits should aim for a “complete end” to the nuclear and peace issues on the Korean peninsula.

He said he has a “clear goal and vision”, which is for the establishment of a lasting peace to replace the ceasefire signed at the end of the 1950-53 Korean war. It also includes the normalization of North Korea-U.S. relations, the development of inter-Korean ties, and economic cooperation involving Pyongyang and Washington, he said.

However, the United States must also add its guarantee in order for peace to come about, Moon said.

“Whether the two Koreas live together or separately, we have to make it in a way that they prosper together and in peace, without interfering or causing damage to each other,” Moon said.

The Blue House official said this could mean stopping propaganda broadcasts at the border that are commonly blasted from both sides over loudspeakers. The official could not say whether “interference” also referred to criticism over widely recognized human rights violations in North Korea.

South Korea and the United States will resume joint military drills next month, although the exercises are expected to overlap with the summit between the two Koreas.

Seoul and Washington delayed the annual drills until after the Winter Olympics, helping to foster conditions for a restart of such talks.

North Korea regularly denounces the drills as preparation for war but a South Korean special envoy has said Kim understood that the allies must continue their “routine” exercises. That exchange has not been confirmed.

The North’s official KCNA news agency said on Wednesday a “dramatic atmosphere for reconciliation” had been created in cross-border ties and there had also been a sign of change in North Korea-U.S. relations.

That was “thanks to the proactive measure and peace-loving proposal” made by Pyongyang, not Trump’s campaign to put maximum pressure on the country, KCNA said in a commentary.

The Blue House official also said earlier on Wednesday South Korea was in discussions with China and Japan for a three-way summit in Tokyo in early May. The three countries have not held such a meeting since November 2015, with relations soured by historical and territorial tensions.

(Reporting by Hyonhee Shin and Christine Kim; Editing by Paul Tait)

Japan, South Korea agree to maintain ‘maximum pressure’ on North Korea: minister

South Korea's National Intelligence Service chief Suh Hoon (L) and Japan's Foreign Minister Taro Kono (2-R) at the start of their meeting at the Iikura Guest House in Tokyo, Japan, 12 March 2018. REUTERS/Franck Robichon/Pool

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan and South Korea agreed on Monday that maximum pressure must be maintained on North Korea until it takes concrete action toward addressing concerns about its nuclear weapon and missile programs, Japan’s foreign minister said.

“Japan and South Korea agreed we will continue to apply maximum pressure on North Korea until it results in concrete action,” the minister, Taro Kono, told reporters, after talks with South Korean National Intelligence Service chief Suh Hoon.

Kono declined to say what that concrete action should be or whether Japan had softened its position on action as a prerequisite for talks.

U.S. President Donald Trump has agreed to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un by the end of May. South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in also plans a summit with Kim by the end of April.

Kono also said Japan would be willing to provide money for International Atomic Energy Agency inspections if needed.

He said Japan would work closely with the United States and South Korea including on solving the issue of Japanese citizens abducted in the past by North Korea.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Trump says prepared to meet North Korea’s Kim in first-ever such parley

FILE PHOTO - A combination photo shows a Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) handout of Kim Jong Un released on May 10, 2016, and Donald Trump posing for a photo in New York City, U.S., May 17, 2016. REUTERS/KCNA handout via Reuters/File Photo & REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo

By Christine Kim and Steve Holland

SEOUL/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump said he was prepared to meet North Korea’s Kim Jong Un in what would be the first face-to-face encounter between leaders from the two countries and could mark a breakthrough in a standoff over the North’s nuclear weapons.

Kim had “committed to denuclearization” and to suspending nuclear and missile tests, South Korea’s National Security Office head Chung Eui-yong told reporters at the White House on Thursday after briefing Trump on a meeting South Korean officials held with Kim earlier this week.

Kim and Trump have engaged in an increasingly bellicose exchange of insults over the North’s nuclear and missile programs, which it pursues in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions, before an easing of tension coinciding with last month’s Winter Olympics in the South.

“A meeting is being planned,” Trump said on Twitter after speaking to Chung, setting up what would be his biggest foreign policy gamble since taking office in January 2017.

Chung said Trump agreed to meet by May in response to Kim’s invitation. A senior U.S. official said later it could happen “in a matter of a couple of months, with the exact timing and place still to be determined.”

Both Russia and China, who joined years of on-again, off-again “six-party” talks, along with the United States, the two Koreas and Japan, aimed at ending the standoff, welcomed the new, positive signals after months of deteriorating relations between North Korea and the United States.

Trump has derided the North Korean leader as a “maniac,” referred to him as “little rocket man” and threatened in a speech to the United Nations last year to “totally destroy” Kim’s country of 26 million people if it attacked the United States or one of its allies.

Kim responded by calling the U.S. president a “mentally deranged U.S. dotard.”

South Korean President Moon Jae-In, who led the pursuit of detente with North Korea during his country’s hosting of the Winter Olympics, said the summit would set a course for denuclearization, according to a presidential spokesman. Trump had agreed to meet Kim without any preconditions, another South Korean official said.

Asian stock markets rose on the news, with Japan’s Nikkei <.N225> ending up 0.5 percent and South Korean stocks <.KS11> more than 1 percent higher. The dollar also rose against the safe-haven Japanese yen <JPY=>. U.S. stock index futures were little changed ahead of the market’s open Friday morning. [MKTS/GLOB]

“It’s good news, no doubt,” said Hong Chun-Uk, chief economist at Kiwoom Securities in Seoul. “But this will likely prove to be only a short-lived factor unless more and stronger actions follow.”

Trump had previously said he was willing to meet Kim under the right circumstances but had indicated the time was not right for such talks. He mocked U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in October for “wasting his time” trying to talk to North Korea.

Tillerson said earlier on Thursday during a visit to Africa that, although “talks about talks” might be possible with Pyongyang, denuclearization negotiations were likely a long way off.

‘NO MISSILE TESTS’

“Kim Jong Un talked about denuclearization with the South Korean Representatives, not just a freeze,” Trump said on Twitter on Thursday night. “Also, no missile testing by North Korea during this period of time. Great progress being made but sanctions will remain until an agreement is reached.”

A meeting between Kim and Trump, whose exchange of insults had raised fear of war, would be a major turnaround after a year in which North Korea has carried out a battery of tests aimed at developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of hitting the U.S. mainland.

Trump’s aides have been wary of North Korea’s diplomatic overtures because of its history of reneging on international commitments and the failure of efforts on disarmament by previous U.S. administrations.

South Koreans responded positively to the news, with online comments congratulating Moon for laying the groundwork for the Trump-Kim talks. Some even suggested Moon should receive the Nobel Peace prize, although scepticism over previous failed talks remained.

North and South Korea, where the United Sates stations 28,500 troops, are technically still at war after their 1950-53 conflict ended in a ceasefire, not a truce.

‘IT MADE SENSE’

Daniel Russel, until last April the assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific, the most senior U.S. diplomatic position for Asia, said he wanted to see detail and hear from North Korea on the plans.

“Also remember that (North Korea) has for many years proposed that the president of the United States personally engage with North Korea’s leaders as an equal – one nuclear power to another,” he said. “What is new isn’t the proposal, it’s the response.”

A senior administration official told Reuters that Trump agreed to the meeting because it “made sense to accept an invitation to meet with the one person who can actually make decisions instead of repeating the sort of long slog of the past”.

“President Trump has made his reputation on making deals,” the official said.

Republican U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham said Trump’s firm stance on North Korea gave the best hope in decades to resolve the threat peacefully.

“A word of warning to North Korean President Kim Jong Un – the worst possible thing you can do is meet with President Trump in person and try to play him,” Graham said on Twitter. “If you do that, it will be the end of you – and your regime.”

Some U.S. officials and experts worry North Korea could buy time to build up and refine its nuclear arsenal if it drags out talks with Washington.

‘TANGIBLE STEPS’

In what would be a key North Korean concession, Chung, the South Korean official, said Kim understood that “routine” joint military exercises between South Korea and the United States must continue.

Pyongyang had previously demanded that such joint drills, which it has said it sees as a preparation for invasion, be suspended in order for any U.S. talks to go forward.

Tensions over North Korea rose to their highest in years in 2017 and the Trump administration warned that all options were on the table, including military ones, in dealing with Pyongyang.

Signs of a thaw emerged this year, with North and South Korea resuming talks and North Korea attending the Winter Olympics. During the Pyongyang talks this week, the two Koreas agreed on a summit in late April, their first since 2007.

Japan, however, remained cautious.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Trump, in a call on Thursday, vowed to continue to enforce sanctions until Pyongyang took “tangible steps … toward denuclearization,” the White House said in a statement late Thursday.

“Japan and the United States will not waver in their firm stance that they will continue to put maximum pressure until North Korea takes concrete action towards the complete, verifiable and irreversible end to nuclear missile development,” Abe told reporters in Tokyo.

(Reporting by Christine Kim in SEOUL, and Jeff Mason, David Brunnstrom, Matt Spetalnick, Steve Holland, Yara Bayoumy and John Walcott in WASHINGTON; Additional reporting by Eric Beech, Mohammad Zargham, Susan Cornwell and Susan Heavey in WASHINGTON, and Kaori Kaneko in TOKYO; Writing by Lincoln Feast; Editing by Paul Tait and Nick Macfie)

Over hotpot and soju, North Korea’s Kim Jong Un joked about himself

FILE PHOTO: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un waves to people attending a military parade marking the 105th birth anniversary of country's founding father, Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang, April 15, 2017. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj/File Photo

By Christine Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea’s Kim Jong Un joked about his image in international media while serving South Korean officials local spirits and cold noodles during their unprecedented visit to Pyongyang this week, two South Korean government sources said.

During the meeting, Kim committed to giving up his nuclear weapons and told the South Korea officials he would like to meet U.S. President Donald Trump, delegation leader Chung Eui-yong told reporters at the White House on Thursday – a potentially dramatic breakthrough in nuclear tensions with Pyongyang.

Kim made light-hearted remarks about how he is viewed outside North Korea in international media and elsewhere, one Blue House official said. The officials who spoke asked to remain unnamed due to the sensitivity of the issue.

The North Korean leader, repeatedly derided as “Little Rocket Man” by Trump, was “very aware” of his image, the official said, and reacted to comments made about him in a “relaxed” manner by joking about himself from time to time.

South Korean officials say Trump and Kim now plan to meet by the end of May, in what would be the first ever meeting between a sitting U.S. President and a North Korean leader.

Tensions rose to their highest in years in 2017 following a battery of missile tests by North Korea, before a detente championed by South Korean President Moon Jae-In during his country’s hosting of the Winter Olympics began to bear fruit.

Kim told the visiting delegation Moon could rest easy at night now that Pyongyang had decided not to carry out nuclear or missile tests while talks were ongoing, a Blue House official said.

“President Moon has had a rough time chairing national security meetings at the break of dawn whenever we fired missiles,” Kim was cited as saying during a dinner meeting with the visiting South Koreans.

“If working-level talks ever cease and hostility appears, (President Moon) and I can easily resolve it with a phone call,” Kim referring to the hotline the two Koreas are planning to install to connect Kim and Moon. It will be the first such hotline to be set up between the heads of the two Koreas.

The Trump administration has warned all options are on the table, including military ones, in dealing with Pyongyang, which has pursued its weapons programs in defiance of ever tougher U.N. sanctions.

When the South Korean officials visited, no hard feelings were displayed and Kim Jong Un was the first to tackle sensitive topics, including the resumption of a military exercise between South Korea and the United States that was postponed for a peaceful Winter Olympics, the Blue House official said.

“This is when we knew the efforts of North and South Korea taken after the Moon Jae-in administration began had paid off,” said one participant of the North Korea visit.

Kim’s administration had also taken note of what North Korean foods the South Korean officials had mentioned while his sister Kim Yo Jong was visiting Seoul for the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.

The delegation was served North Korean hotpot the first day and cold noodles – another regional specialty – the next, the Blue House official said.

Kim and the officials shared several bottles of wine, liquor made of ginseng and Pyongyang soju, the official said.

“The bottles kept coming,” said another administrative source who had official knowledge of the meeting.

The South Korean visitors to Pyongyang did not see one-on-one trackers that usually follow visitors in the North and were free to move about on the premises of the hotel, the first official added.

At the dinner on the first night, South Korean officials were able to observe the relationship between Kim and his wife, Ri Sol Ju, said the second administrative source.

The source said Kim did not come across as overbearing, describing the spouses as appearing “equal”.

“They seemed to be quite close to one another and he didn’t seem like one of your conservative husbands.”

(Reporting by Christine Kim; Editing by Lincoln Feast)