Top-level talks to save summit
Kim’s top envoy in New York, talks take place in three countries
Kim Jong Un’s top envoy the US Secretary of State were expected to sit through a full day of talks today as preparations ahead of a planned summit this month gather pace.
Kim Yong Chol, the former military intelligence chief and one of the North Korean leader’s closest aides, arrived in New York from Beijing yesterday and had dinner with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo last night as they try to salvage prospects for the high-stakes summit between Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump. It’s the highest-level official North Korean visit to the United States in 18 years.
Kim Yong Chol and Pompeo, who travelled from Washington, had dinner for about an hour-and-a-half. The two planned a “day full of meetings” today, the White House said. Their talks will be aimed at determining whether a meeting between Trump and Kim Jong Un, originally scheduled for June 12 but later cancelled by Trump, can be restored, US officials have said.
The talks come as preparations for the highly anticipated summit in Singapore were barrelling forward on both sides of the Pacific Ocean, despite lingering uncertainty about whether it will really occur, and when. As Kim and Pompeo were meeting in New York, other US teams were meeting with North Korean officials in Singapore and in the heavily fortified Korean Demilitarised Zone.
“If it happens, we’ll certainly be ready,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said of the Singapore summit. Regarding the date for the meeting, she added, “We’re going to continue to shoot for June 12th.”
North Korea’s flurry of diplomatic activity following a torrid run in nuclear weapons and missile tests in last year suggests that Kim Jong Un is eager for sanctions relief to build his economy and the international legitimacy the summit with Trump would provide. But there are lingering doubts on whether Kim will ever fully relinquish his nuclear arsenal, which he may see as his only guarantee of survival in a region surrounded by enemies.
Trump announced that Kim Yong Chol was coming to New York for talks with Pompeo in a tweet on Wednesday in which he said he had a “great team” working on the summit. That was a shift from last week, when Trump announced in an open letter to Kim Jong Un that he had decided to “terminate” the summit following a provocative statement from the North.
Pompeo, Trump’s former CIA chief, has travelled to Pyongyang twice in recent weeks for meetings with Kim Jong Un, and has said there is a “shared understanding” between the two sides about what they hope to achieve in talks.
South Korean media speculated that Pompeo could make a third trip to Pyongyang and that Kim Yong Chol was carrying a personal letter from Kim Jong Un and might push to travel to Washington to meet with Trump.
North Korea and the US are still technically at war and have no diplomatic ties because the 1950-53 Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.
Trump views a summit as a legacy-defining opportunity to make the nuclear deal that has evaded others, but he pledged to walk away from the meeting if he believed the North wasn’t serious about discussing dismantling its nuclear programme.
The White House emphasised that it has remained in close contact with South Korean and Japanese officials as preparations for the talks continue. South Korean President Moon Jae In has lobbied hard for nuclear negotiations between Trump and Kim Jong Un and held a surprise meeting with the North Korean leader on Sunday in an effort to keep the summit alive.