Doubts, challenges arise about meeting with Kim

WASHINGTON — A day after President Donald Trump accepted an invitation to meet Kim Jong Un of North Korea, the White House on Friday began planning a high-level diplomatic encounter so risky and seemingly far-fetched that some of Trump’s aides believe it will never happen.

The administration is already deliberating over the logistics and location of the meeting, with a senior State Department diplomat noting that the most obvious venue is the Peace House, a conference building in the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea.

But several officials said the United States still needed to establish direct contact with North Korea to verify the message from Kim that was conveyed Thursday by South Korean envoys to Trump. They warned that Kim could change his mind or break the promises he made about halting nuclear and missile tests during talks.

‘‘The United States has made zero concessions, but North Korea has made some promises,’’ said the White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders. ‘‘This meeting won’t take place without concrete actions that match the promises that have been made by North Korea.’’

Sanders said North Korea has made promises to denuclearize, stop its nuclear and missile testing and allow joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises. But questions remained over exactly what North Korea means by “denuclearize” and what the U.S. might be risking with a highly publicized summit that will build up Kim’s stature among world leaders.

Administration officials later clarified that Sanders was not adding new preconditions to the meeting, merely emphasizing the consequences if Kim conducted tests or interfered with joint military exercises between the United States and South Korea that are scheduled to begin at the end of March.

The White House’s muddled message underscored the confusion sowed by Trump’s on-the-spot decision Thursday to meet Kim. Having built its North Korea policy on sanctions and threats of military action, the administration must now learn the language of engagement.

Trump’s decision stunned allies and his own advisers, not least Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who was traveling in Africa when the president accepted Kim’s invitation, during an Oval Office briefing with the envoys, who had met Monday with the North Korean leader.

Tillerson’s lack of involvement in the announcement highlighted how marginalized the State Department has become in North Korea policy. The department’s chief negotiator on North Korea, Joseph Yun, resigned from the Foreign Service last week.

Other State Department officials insisted that Tillerson had not been singled out; Trump blindsided all of his advisers. And the secretary, speaking to reporters in Djibouti, argued that Trump’s decision was not the bolt from the blue that it seemed.

‘‘This is something that he’s had on his mind for quite some time, so it was not a surprise in any way,’’ Tillerson said. ‘‘He’s expressed it openly before about his willingness to meet with Kim Jong Un.’’

The wider world has grown fearful of a resumption of the Korean War that ended in 1953 without a peace treaty. But the prospect of the first U.S.-North Korea summit has allayed those fears somewhat. The European Union, Russia and China — whose leader spoke by phone with Trump on Friday — have all welcomed the move.

North Korea’s government has yet to formally comment on its invitation to Trump. South Korea said the president agreed to meet Kim by May, but Sanders said Friday that no time and place had been set.