N Korea still open to Trump meeting
NORTH Korea said yesterday it was still open to talks with the United States after President Donald Trump called off a summit with leader Kim Jong Un, adding it hoped the “Trump formula” could resolve the standoff over its nuclear weapons programme.
Mr Trump on Thursday announced his withdrawal from what would have been the firstever meeting between a serving US president and a North Korean leader, scheduled for Singapore on June 12, in a letter to Mr Kim, citing North Korea’s “tremendous anger and open hostility”.
Mr Trump’s decision came after repeated threats by North Korea to pull out of the summit over what it saw as confrontational remarks by US officials.
“We have inwardly highly appreciated President Trump for having made the bold decision, which any other US presidents dared not, and made efforts for such a crucial event as the summit,” North Korean Vice-Foreign Minister Kim Kye Gwan said in a statement carried by state media.
“We even inwardly hoped that what is called ‘Trump formula’ would help clear both sides of their worries and comply with the requirements of our side and would be a wise way of substantial effect for settling the issue,” he said, without elaborating.
Kim Kye Gwan said North Korea’s recent criticisms of certain US officials had been a reaction to unbridled American rhetoric, and that the current antagonism showed “the urgent necessity” for the summit.
“His sudden and unilateral announcement to cancel the summit is something unexpected to us and we can not but feel great regret for it,” Kim Kye Gwan said, adding that North Korea remained open to resolving issues with Washington “regardless of ways, at any time”.
North Korea had sharply criticised suggestions by Mr Trump’s national security adviser, John Bolton, and Vice-President Mike Pence that it could share the fate of Libya if it did not swiftly surrender its nuclear arsenal. Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was deposed and killed by Nato-backed militants after halting his nascent nuclear programme.
Mr Trump had initially sought to placate North Korea, saying that he was not pursuing the “Libya model” in getting the North to abandon its nuclear weapons programme.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also said: “This is the President Trump model. He’s going to run this the way he sees fit.”
While the Trump administration had insisted on North Korea’s complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantling of its nuclear programme, Pyongyang had always couched its language in terms of denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula.
It has said in previous, failed talks that it could consider giving up its arsenal if the United States provided security guarantees by removing its troops from South Korea and withdrew its so-called nuclear umbrella of deterrence from South Korea and Japan.
North Korea on Thursday announced it had completely dismantled its Punggye-ri nuclear test facility “to ensure the transparency of discontinuance” of nuclear testing.
Footage of the event broadcast by South Korean media yesterday showed explosions throwing up huge clouds of dust and debris as they destroyed tunnel entrances and multiple wooden structures around the site.
Some analysts are worried the cancelling of the summit could prompt a resumption in hostilities, including renewed shorter-range missile tests or stepped-up cyber attacks by Pyongyang and increased sanctions or deployment of new military assets by Washington.
Mr Trump, in his letter, sounded a bellicose note, warning Mr Kim of the United States’ greater nuclear might, reminiscent of the president’s tweet last year asserting that he had a “much bigger” nuclear button than North Koreans.
Many South Koreans reacted angrily to the announcement, feeling they had been cheated of a chance of a lifetime to live in peace.