KIM: I WANT TO SCRAP NUCLEAR WEAPONS BY 2021

▶ North Korean leader’s pledge comes as he agrees to hold third summit with the South later this month

North Korea’s Kim Jong-un says he wants to dismantle his nuclear programme during US President Donald Trump’s first term, giving a timeframe for the first time.

Mr Kim also agreed to a third summit with South Korean leader Moon Jae-in in Pyongyang, starting September 18.

The summit could provide new momentum to talks about denuclearisation, after Mr Trump last month cancelled a visit to the North by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Mr Kim told South Korean officials his faith in Mr Trump was unchanged and he wanted to abandon the nuclear programme and end hostile relations before Mr Trump’s first term in office ends in early 2021, Mr Moon’s national security adviser, Chung Eui-yong, said on Thursday.

“He particularly emphasised that he has never said anything negative about President Trump,” Mr Chung said.

North Korea said in previous failed talks over the years that it could consider giving up its nuclear programme if the US provided security guarantees by removing its troops from South Korea and withdrawing its “umbrella of deterrence” from South Korea and Japan.

US officials say North Korea refused to even start discussions about defining denuclearisation and has insisted America must first agree to remove some sanctions at the same time.

Mr Chung said Mr Kim had stressed the need for the US to copy North Korea’s first moves, which included dismantling a nuclear test site and a missile engine factory.

Mr Kim told Mr Chung and other envoys that it was his “fixed stand” to turn the Korean Peninsula into a “cradle of peace without nuclear weapons and free from nuclear threat”, the North’s official KCNA news agency reported.

Mr Chung said the leader showed “frustration over the doubt raised by some parts of the international community about his willingness to end the nuclear programme and asked us to convey his message to the US”.

He said the two Koreas also planned to open a liaison office before the third summit in the North’s border city of Kaesong, staffed by officials from both sides, Mr Chung said.

Mr Kim and Mr Trump held a landmark summit in Singapore in June, in which they agreed to work towards complete denuclearisation.

But talks have made little progress and there have been signs North Korea is still working on weapons.

In this year’s talks, North Korea and the US have been at odds over whether denuclearisation or declaring an end to the 1950-1953 Korean War should come first.

The war ended with an armistice not a peace treaty, meaning US-led United Nations forces, including South Korea, are technically still at war with the North.

Pyongyang has long sought a formal end to the war but US officials have said such a declaration could weaken North Korea’s incentive to denuclearise and raise questions about the 28,500 US troops stationed in South Korea.