TRUMP-KIM SUMMIT IN PLAY AS MOON VISITS WHITE HOUSE

S. Korean president on a mission to salvage US-North diplomatic opening

DONALD Trump holds a high-stakes meeting with South Korea’s president at the White House yesterday, talks that could decide whether the United States president’s much-vaunted summit with the North’s leader Kim Jong-un goes ahead.

Moon Jae-in jets into Washington on a mission to salvage a rare diplomatic opening between the US and North Korea that is in trouble almost before it begins.

Trump had agreed to meet inscrutable “Supreme Leader” Kim in Singapore on June 12, but the first-ever US-North Korea summit is now in serious doubt, with both sides expressing reservations.

South Korea — worried about Kim’s bellicose weapons testing and Trump’s similarly bellicose warnings about a looming war — was instrumental in convincing the two Cold War foes to sit down and talk.

Moon sent his own national security adviser to the White House in March, carrying an offer of talks and word that North Korea might be willing to abandon nuclear weapons, an enticing prospect.

Trump surprised his guests, his own aides and the world by summarily accepting the meeting, seeing an opportunity to “do a deal” and avoid military confrontation.

Pyongyang is on the verge of marrying nuclear and missile technology allowing it to hit the continental US with a nuke, a capability Washington sees as wholly unacceptable.

Since then, there had been a landmark series of intra-Korean meetings, two trips to Pyongyang by Mike Pompeo — first as CIA director then as America’s top diplomat — and three American citizens have been released from the North.

But, after several Trumpian victory laps, North Korea’s willingness to denuclearise is now in serious doubt.

Earlier this month, North Korea denounced US demands for “unilateral nuclear abandonment” and cancelled at the last minute a high-level meeting with the South in protest over joint military drills between Seoul and Washington.

Trump responded by saying the meeting may or may not take place.

EPA PIC South Korean President Moon Jae-in and his wife, Kim Jung-sook, arriving at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Monday.