Trump hints at direct US talks with North Korea
In the midst of a jokefilled monologue at a dinner with journalists, President Donald Trump has suggested that the US will be meeting with North Korea but has told Pyongyang it must first “denuke.”
“Now we are talking and they, by the way, called up a couple of days ago. They said that ‘we would like to talk.’ And I said ‘So would we, but you have to denuke, you have to denuke,’“Trump said at the annual Gridiron Club dinner. “We will be meeting and we’ll see if anything positive happens,” he added.
It was unclear if Trump was joking or if formal US-North Korea talks were imminent. “I won’t rule out direct talks with Kim Jong Un. I just won’t,” he said. Trump did, however, make a joke at his own expense. “As far as the risk of dealing with a madman is concerned, that’s his problem, not mine,” Trump said.
If a meeting were to come together, it would be the first
WASHINGTON:
between the Trump administration and Pyongyang, which are in a standoff over North’s development of nuclear weapons capable of hitting the United States.
Trump’s remarks came shortly before South Korea’s presidency announced on Sunday that a high-level delegation of South Korean officials will travel to North Korea on Monday to discuss improving relations on the peninsula and possible talks between Washington and Pyongyang. After the two-day visit to North Korea, the special envoys will travel to the United States to brief officials on their discussions in Pyongyang, South Korea’s presidential Blue House said.
Last month, US Vice President Mike Pence was scheduled to meet with North Korean officials, including leader Kim Jong Un’s sister, while in South Korea for the Winter Olympics but the North Koreans cancelled at the last minute, US officials said.