North Korean dictator, Seoul envoys have ‘openhearted talk’

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had an “openhearted talk” in Pyongyang with envoys for South Korean President Moon Jae-in, the North said Tuesday.

It’s the first time South Korean officials have met with the young North Korean leader in person since he took power after his dictator father’s death in late 2011 – and the latest sign that the Koreas are trying to mend ties after a year of repeated North Korean weapons tests and threats of nuclear war.

North Korea’s state media said Kim expressed his desire to “write a new history of national reunification” during a dinner Monday night that Seoul said lasted four hours.

Given the robust history of bloodshed, threats and animosity on the Korean Peninsula, there is North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, left, shakes hands with South Korean National Security Director Chung Eui-yong in Pyongyang, North Korea.

considerable skepticism over whether the Koreas’ apparent warming relations will lead to lasting peace.

North Korea, some believe, is trying to use improved ties with the South to weaken U.s.-led international sanctions and

pressure, and to provide domestic propaganda fodder for Kim Jong Un.

But each new development also raises the possibility that the rivals can use the momentum from the good feelings created during North Korea’s participation in the South’s Pyeongchang Winter Olympics last month to ease a standoff over North Korea’s nuclear ambitions and restart talks between Pyongyang and Washington.

The North Korean report sought to make Kim look statesmanlike as he welcomed the visiting South Koreans, with Kim offering views on “activating the versatile dialogue, contact, cooperation and exchange.”

He was also said to have given “important instruction to the relevant field to rapidly take practical steps for” a summit with Moon, which the North proposed last month.

Moon, a liberal who is keen to engage the North, likely wants to visit Pyongyang. But he must first broker better ties between the North and Washington, which is Seoul’s top ally and its military protector.

A senior Cuban official on Monday condemned Washington’s decision to make the withdrawal of 60 percent of the U.S. Embassy staff permanent in response to mysterious ailments affecting American diplomats.

Carlos Fernandez de Cossio, the new director of U.S. issues at the foreign ministry, said the decision was motivated by politics and had nothing to do with the safety of diplomats.

The State Department made the cuts permanent last week. It initially scaled back staff in October in response to hearing loss and other ailments affecting at least 24 U.S. citizens.

Four gunmen burst into a hospital in the Mexican resort of Cancun and shot to death a drug gang suspect and his wife, officials in the Caribbean coast state of Quintana Roo said Monday.

The suspected drug trafficker was Alfonso Contreras Espinoza, alias “El Poncho,” according to a state official who was not authorized to be quoted by name.

Contreras Espinoza was arrested in July on weapons charges, but had been allowed out of a local prison under guard. He was believed to head the Cancun operations of the Gulf drug cartel.

– Appeal-democrat news services