ROK: Trump to meet DPRK’s Kim by May

World Today

ROK: Trump to meet DPRK's Kim by MayROK National Security Advisor Chung Eui-yong (C), flanked by ROK National Intelligence Service chief Suh Hoon (L) and ROK’s ambassador to the United States Cho Yoon-je (R), briefs reporters outside the West Wing of the White House on March 8, 2018 in Washington, DC, announcing DPRK leader Kim Jong Un has offered to meet US President Donald Trump. / AFP PHOTO / MANDEL NGAN

President Donald Trump has accepted an offer of a summit from the DPRK leader and will meet with Kim Jong Un by May, a top ROK official said Thursday, in a remarkable turnaround in relations between two historic adversaries.

CGTN has full coverage of the recent announcement of U.S. President Donald Trump’s accepting an invitation by the DPRK’s Kim Jong-un to for a visit in May. For More CGTN’s Mike Walter spoke with correspondent Owen Fairclough, Nathan King and Shane Hahm in Seoul.

The ROK national security director, Chung Eui-yong, told reporters of the planned meeting outside the White House, after briefing Trump and other top U.S. officials about a rare meeting with Kim in the DPRK capital on Monday.

No serving American president has ever met with a DPRK leader. The U.S. and DPRK do not even have formal diplomatic relations. The two nations remain in a state of war because the 1950-53 Korean War ended with an armistice and not a peace treaty.

Seoul had already publicized that DPRK had offered talks with the United States on denuclearization and normalizing ties, providing a diplomatic opening after a year of escalating tensions over the DPRK’s nuclear and missile tests. The rival Koreas also agreed to hold a leadership summit in late April.

“He (Kim) expressed his eagerness to meet President Trump as soon as possible,” Chung said. “President Trump appreciated the briefing and said he would meet Kim Jong Un by May to achieve permanent denuclearization.”

Chung did not say where Trump would meet with Kim.

Trump took office vowing to stop DPRK from attaining a nuclear-tipped missile that could reach the U.S. mainland. He’s oscillated between threats and insults directed at Kim, and more conciliatory rhetoric. His more bellicose talk, and Kim’s nuclear and missile tests, have fueled fears of war.

Trump, who has ramped up economic sanctions on DPRK to force it to negotiate on giving up its nukes, has threatened the pariah nation with “fire and fury” if its threats against the U.S. and its allies continued. He has derided Kim by referring to him as “Little Rocket Man.”

After Kim repeated threats against the U.S. in a New Year’s address and mentioned the “nuclear button” on his office desk, Trump responded by tweeting that he has a nuclear button, too, “but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!”

Story by The Associated Press


Chad O’Carroll on announcement of direct US-DPRK talks

U.S. President Donald Trump has agreed to meet with DPRK leader Kim Jong-Un “by May,” according to South Korean National Security Adviser Chung Eui-Yong. The official made a surprise announcement at the White House on Thursday, after having delivered a letter from Kim Jong Un to the U.S. president. Chad O’Carroll, CEO and founder of the Korea Risk Group and North Kora News, discusses with CGTN’s Mike Walter.