Trump says Kim meeting June 12

Singapore will serve as the site of talks on nuclear program

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he will meet North Korea’s Kim Jong Un on June 12 in Singapore, setting up a historic summit in hopes of getting Kim to give up his nuclear weapon programs.

“The highly anticipated meeting between Kim Jong Un and myself will take place in Singapore on June 12th,” Trump tweeted. “We will both try to make it a very special moment for World Peace!”

Trump will be the first sitting U.S. president to meet with a leader of North Korea, which emerged as a communist state after World War II. Its development of nuclear weapons over the past two decades has posed a major threat to global security.

Foreign policy analysts said the summit is likely to generate good headlines, given Trump’s eagerness to make a deal and Kim’s attempts to look cooperative.

Some expressed skepticism that Kim would follow through on Trump’s major goal: Disarmament.

“Can they get along? Yes,” said David Rothkopf, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “I think it’s highly, highly unlikely that Kim Jong Un actually gives up nuclear weapons.”

Trump’s tweeted announcement about the meeting capped weeks of negotiations that began when the president announced March 8 he had accepted Kim’s invitation, which was delivered by South Korean officials.

Trump said he would continue urging China and other nations to cut off economic aid to North Korea until it agrees to give up its nuclear weapons programs.

“A lot of things can happen,” Trump said Wednesday. “A lot of good things can happen. A lot of bad things can happen. I believe that … both sides want to negotiate a deal.”

Negotiators cleared a major hurdle this week when North Korea released three American prisoners.

In welcoming the three back to the U.S. early Thursday morning, Trump said Kim “really was excellent to these three incredible people.”