Trump open to U.S.-N. Korea talks

Discussions could be held ‘under right circumstances’

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump threw his weight behind the Olympics-inspired diplomatic opening with North Korea, telling South Korea’s leader Wednesday that the U.S. was open to talks with Kim Jong Un’s government under the right circumstances.

A White House statement said Trump and South Korean President Moon Jae-in still agreed on the importance of continuing the “maximum pressure” campaign against North Korea over its development of nuclear weapons — the U.S.-led barrage of international sanctions that is starting to bite the North’s meager economy.

But South Korea’s presidential office also said Trump told Moon to let North Korea understand that there will be no military action of any kind while the two Koreas continue to hold dialogue, the Yonhap news agency reported. On Tuesday, the two Koreas held their first talks in two years and agreed on the North’s participation in the Winter Olympics being held in the South next month.

The prospects of resolving decades-old tensions on the divided Korean Peninsula remain deeply uncertain. North Korea has shown no willingness to discuss its nuclear weapons which pose an emerging threat to the American mainland, and it has stuck to its tough stance toward Washington while it tries to woo the South. The newspaper of the ruling party on Tuesday called Trump a “lunatic” and said the U.S. needs to accept North Korea is now a nuclear power.

But the thaw between North and South provides a diplomatic opening after months of escalating tensions that have fueled fears of war. “President Trump expressed his openness to holding talks between the United States and North Korea at the appropriate time, under the right circumstances,” the White House statement said.