N KOREAN OFFICIAL HEADED TO NEW YORK, SAYS TRUMP
FLURRY OF ACTIVITY ExUS envoy to S Korea Sung Kim will meet North’s foreign ministry official at Korean border
WASHINGTON: Kim Young Chol, the vice chairman of North Korea who is called the right-hand man of Kim Jong-un, is reaching the US for talks, the White House said on Tuesday.
This was the first acknowledgement that preparations were on for President Donald Trump’s summit with the North Korean leader in Singapore. Trump had cancelled the summit in a letter to Kim on May 24, accusing Pyongyang of “tremendous anger and open hostility.”
“The United States continues to actively prepare for President Trump’s expected summit with leader Kim in Singapore,” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement.
She said Trump will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in the White House on June 7.
Kim Yong Chol, who will arrive on Tuesday, will meet secretary of state Mike Pompeo. They had met twice during Pompeo’s visits to Pyongyang, first as CIA director and then as the top American diplomat.
Trump tweeted: “Meetings are currently taking place concerning Summit, and more. Kim Young Chol, the Vice Chairman of North Korea, heading now to New York. Solid response to my letter, thank you!”
Kim is a four-star general who serves as a vice chairman on the central committee of North Korea’s Workers’ Party and heads a government bureau that runs engagement with South Korea. He is also a former spy chief, accused by Seoul of masterminding deadly attacks on a South Korean navy ship and an island in 2010 that killed nearly 50 South Koreans. The US has linked him to the hacking of Sony Pictures’ computer networks in 2014 and has him on its list of sanctioned entities.
Kim’s visit to the US is the first by a high-ranking official since October 2000, when then North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, the present leader’s father, had despatched Vice Marshal Jo Myong Rok to meet with then President Bill Clinton and deliver him a letter. Then secretary of state Madeline Albright had followed up by visiting Pyongyang and meeting the North Korean leader. The talks went nowhere.
A team of US officials headed by White House deputy chief of staff Joe Hagin is in Singapore working on logistics tied to the June 12 summit, Sanders said.
Trump has indicated the meeting could take place later if not on June 12, and at some other location and that it could even be extended.
They are working with a team of North Korean officials led by Kim Chang Son, who is said to be a sort of chief of staff to Kim.