Kim: US acting in ‘bad faith’ at Hanoi summit
VLADIVOSTOK, Russia: Kim Jong Un has accused the US of acting in “bad faith” in talks on its nuclear arsenal, his state media said Friday, as the North Korean leader left Russia following his first summit with President Vladimir Putin.
Kim’s armoured train departed the Far Eastern port city of Vladivostok a day after talks that saw Putin back the North’s need for “security guarantees” in its standoff with the United States.
The official Korean Central News Agency reported that Kim told Putin the US adopted a “unilateral attitude in bad faith” at a summit attended by US President Donald Trump two months ago in Hanoi.
“Peace and security on the Korean peninsula will entirely depend on the US future attitude, and the DPRK will gird itself for every possible situation,” Kim was quoted as saying.
The Kim-Trump summit broke down in late February without a deal, after cash- strapped Pyongyang demanded immediate relief from sanctions but the two sides disagreed over what the North was prepared to give up in return.
Russia has called for the sanctions to be eased, while the US has accused it of trying to help Pyongyang evade some of the measures – accusations Moscow denies.
Just a week ago, Pyongyang demanded the removal of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo from the stalled nuclear talks, accusing him of derailing the process.
On Thursday, Putin emerged from the meeting saying that like Washington, Moscow supports efforts to reduce tensions and prevent nuclear conflicts.
But he also insisted that the North needed “guarantees of its security, the preservation of its sovereignty”.
“We need to... return to a state where international law, not the law of the strongest, determines the situation in the world,” Putin said.
It was “what the North has been saying all along” said Kim Keun- sik, professor of North Korean Studies at Kyungnam University, adding that Putin’s support for Pyongyang’s stance was the “biggest prize” Kim won in Vladivostok.