TrumpKim meet to happen soon

UNITED NATIONS: United States President Donald Trump, who orchestrated a spur-of-the-moment June encounter with Kim Jong Un that saw him become the first US president to set foot in North Korea, said Monday (Tuesday in Manila) that another meeting with the North Korean leader “could happen soon.”

Trump provided few details, and it wasn’t clear what officials were doing behind the scenes to set up a meeting meant to address a diplomatic impasse over the North’s development of nuclear- armed missiles targeting the US mainland.

But Trump’s comments, even with few specifics backing them up, are tantalizing because there is extreme interest, especially in Japan and South Korea, in whether Trump and Kim can strike a deal on one of the world’s most pressing standoffs.

Trump has also proven that he’s willing to take risks with North Korea that no other US leader has taken, even as critics say his summitry captured the world’s attention but got few concrete results.

Asked on the sidelines of annual General Assembly meetings at the United Nations in New York what it would take for another Kim summit, Trump said: “We’ll see. Right now, people would like to see that happen. I want to know what’s going to be coming out of it. We can know a lot before the summit takes place.”

Trump also met Monday with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, the driving force behind the initial diplomacy that led to the first Trump-Kim meeting last year and defused war talk in 2017.

Moon said the Trump-Kim meeting at the Korean border in June was a “historic moment.” Moon said he expects that negotiations between the United States and North Korea would resume soon and that there would be another summit.

“I always marvel at your imagination and bold decision- making,” Moon told Trump.

At the heart of the Washington-Pyongyang dispute is the impoverished North’s desire for relief from harsh sanctions imposed as it has boosted its nuclear and missile capabilities.

Washington, however, is demanding that Pyongyang first take more comprehensive steps to dismantle a nuclear program that has been painstakingly built over decades.