Surprise Korea meeting shows signs of urgency
security assurances in a region surrounded by enemies.
Kim, in a telling line from a dispatch issued by the North’s state-run news service yesterday, ‘‘expressed his fixed will on the historic (North Korea)-US summit talks.’’ The two Korean leaders agreed to ‘‘positively co-operate with each other as ever to improve (North Korea)-US relations and establish (a) mechanism for permanent and durable peace.’’
They agreed to have their top officials meet again June 1 and to set up separate talks between their top generals.
The meeting came hours after South Korea expressed relief over revived talks for a summit between Trump and Kim.
It remains unclear whether Kim will ever agree to fully abandon his nuclear arsenal in return, despite Moon’s insistence that Kim can be persuaded to abandon his nuclear facilities, materials and bombs in a verifiable and irreversible way in exchange for credible security and economic guarantees.
Moon, who brokered the summit between Washington and Pyongyang, likely used Saturday’s meeting to confirm Kim’s willingness to enter nuclear negotiations with Trump and clarify what steps Kim has in mind in the process of denuclearisation, said Hong Min, a senior analyst at Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification.
‘‘While Washington and Pyongyang have expressed their hopes for a summit through published statements, Moon has to step up as the mediator because the surest way to set the meeting in stone would be an official confirmation of intent between heads of states,’’ Hong said. –AP