Surprise and scepticism as Trump agrees to an arms summit with Kim
NORTH Korean dictator Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump plan to meet in May for nuclear disarmament talks.
The whiplash development would put two leaders who have repeatedly insulted, threatened and dismissed each other in the same room, possibly in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang.
It would have been an unthinkable suggestion just a few months ago when the insults were at their peak — Mr Trump (top right) was a “senile dotard” and Mr Kim (bottom right) was “Little Rocket Man”.
Liberal South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who some believe has manoeuvred the two leaders to this position, reflected the hope and relief many in South Korea feel about the planned summit.
He declared yesterday that it will be a “historical milestone” that will put the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula “really on track”.
However, there is also considerable scepticism. North Korea has made a habit of reaching out after raising fears during previous crises with offers of dialogue.
It has also, from the US point of view, repeatedly cheated on past nuclear deals.
But now the North has landed a face-to-face meeting with the leader of the world’s most powerful country, a nation Pyongyang has long sought to draw into talks.
It hopes to establish a peace treaty to end the technically still-active Korean War and drive out all US troops from the Korean Peninsula, removing what the North says is a hostile encirclement of its territory by Washington and Seoul.
“Great progress being made,” Mr Trump tweeted after South Korean national security director Chung Eui-yong emerged from a meeting with Mr Trump and announced the summit plans to reporters in a hastily called appearance on a White House driveway.
A senior North Korean diplomat at the United Nations, Pak Song-il, told The Washington Post the invitation was the result of Mr Kim’s “broad-minded and resolute decision” to contribute to the peace and security of the Korean Peninsula.
Later, US secretary of state Rex Tillerson said the “dramatic” and surprising change of posture by Mr Kim led Mr Trump to agree to meet the North Korean leader.
Mr Tillerson said the US was taken aback at how “forward-leaning” Mr Kim was in his conversations with a visiting South Korean delegation.
Talks between Washington and Pyongyang have previously been overseen by lower-level experts, and have often been bogged down — even when socalled “breakthroughs” have come — in the details.
Now, the talks will start at the top and there will be no time to settle all the problems that have scuttled previous negotiations.
It remains to be seen what Mr Trump and Mr Kim might decide in the highest-level meeting in what has been essentially a bloody, seven-decade stand-off between their countries.