Hope for talks
North Korea open to US talks despite President Donald Trump axing summit.
SEOUL: North Korea said it’s still willing to sit for talks with the United States “at any time, (in) any format,” a remarkably restrained and diplomatic response, from a nation noted for its proud belligerence, to US President Donald Trump’s abrupt cancellation of a summit with the North’s autocratic leader, Kim Jong-un.
The statement by Vice-Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan, a longtime nuclear negotiator and senior diplomat, which said the North is “willing to give the US time and opportunities” to reconsider talks that had been set for June 12 in Singapore, could be driven by a need to use the summit to ease crushing international sanctions, or by a determination that a summit with the mercurial Trump is the best opportunity the North will ever have to elevate itself, and its nuclear programme, to equality with its archrival.
One analyst marvelled that the North Korean response was “close to an apology letter”.
Regardless of the motivation, Kye-gwan’s statement is the latest whiplash development in efforts to diplomatically address what might be the world’s most dangerous standoff.
Focus will now swing back to how Trump will respond to the North’s seemingly conciliatory gesture.
The stakes are high. A scrapping of diplomacy could see a return to the torrent of weapons tests – and the fears of war they created – that North Korea unleashed last year as it sought to put the finishing touches on a nuclear-armed missile programme meant to target the entire US mainland.
Since January, Kim has taken a radically softer approach to foreign affairs, sending his sister to the Olympics in South Korea, meeting with his South Korean counterpart on their shared border and explod- ing parts of his nuclear testing site on Thursday in an apparent sign of good faith.
The Singapore summit would have been the culmination of this outreach.
Earlier comments by South Korean President Moon Jae-in, seen as a driving force behind the summit and just returned to Seoul from a meeting with Trump in Washington, suggested that the South, a top US ally and host to 28,500 US troops, was blindsided by Trump’s statement.
Moon said he was “perplexed” at Trump’s announcement that he was cancelling the summit because of what the US president said was North Korea’s “tremendous anger and open hostility”.
Moon urged direct talks between Trump and Kim to get things back on track.
Many observers had expected a belligerent North Korean response to Trump’s cancellation, but the comments by Kim, the North’s vice-foreign minister, seemed, at times, almost meek, and in stark contrast to the bellicose declarations last year of the North’s willingness to pursue nuclear war.
Kim said Pyongyang’s “objective and resolve to do our best for the sake of peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula and all humankind remain unchanged”.
Kim said the cancellation of the talks shows “how grave the status of historically deep-rooted hostile North Korea-US relations is and how urgently a summit should be realised to improve ties”.
“As far as the historic (North Korea)-US summit is concerned, 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,” Kim said.
“His sudden and unilateral announcement to cancel the summit is something unexpected to us and we cannot but feel great regret for it.”
Kim speculated that Trump may have “lacked the will for the summit or he might not have felt confident,” but that the North has “exerted sincere efforts” for talks that “would mark a meaningful starting point for peace and security in the region and the world.” — AP