XI HOPES U.S., N. KOREA WILL ‘MEET HALFWAY’

Chinese president offers Kim backing, while S. Korea tells North to be practical on denuclearisation

CHINESE President Xi Jinping offered North Korean leader Kim Jongun firm backing in deadlocked nuclear talks with the United States, insisting the two sides should meet “halfway”, state media said yesterday.

Jong-un visited Beijing for two days of discussions that reasserted China’s role in the process, and were seen as a strategy session ahead of a second summit between the North Korean leader and US President Donald Trump.

At their first meeting in Singapore in June, Jong-un and Trump signed a vaguely worded document with Jong-un pledging to work towards the “denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula”.

But progress has stalled, with Pyongyang and Washington DC, which stations 28,500 troops in South Korea, disagreeing over what that means.

North Korea wants relief from the multiple sanctions imposed on it over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes, while the US wants the measures to remain until Pyongyang gives up its arms, something it has made no public promise to do.

China also wants the sanctions relaxed, and Xi said he “hopes that the DPRK and the United States will meet each other halfway”, according to China’s state news agency, Xinhua, using the initials of the North’s official name.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in said North Korea needed to take “more bold, practical measures for denuclearisation” to ensure sanctions were lifted.

“Corresponding measures must be devised to facilitate North Korea’s continued denuclearisation efforts,” he said yesterday, such as the US agreeing to a “peace regime” and formally declaring an end to the 1950-53 Korean War.

Moon acknowledged that the agreement Jong-un and Trump signed was “somewhat vague”.

He said there was “scepticism” that Jong-un’s “concept of denuclearisation” would be different from what the US wanted.