Tillerson ‘listening’ for outreach

WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said he is “listening” for signs that North Korea is ready to engage in direct talks.

“My job as chef diplomat is to ensure that the North Koreans know, we keep our channels open,” Mr Tillerson told the CBS news show 60 Minutes last night.

“I am listening. I am not sending a lot of messages back because there’s nothing to say to them at this point,” he said, according to excerpts of the interview made available ahead of the broadcast, which happened after press time last night. “So, I am listening for you to tell me you are ready to talk”.

An Olympic-driven thaw in relations between Kim Jong-un’s nuclear-armed regime and South Korea has raised speculation that direct talks between Washington and Pyongyang could be on the horizon after months of sharp tension and heated rhetoric.

“They will tell me,” Mr Tillerson told 60 Minutes. “We receive messages from them, and I think it will be very explicit as to how we want to have that first conversation.”

The top US diplomat however stressed that no incentive was being offered to get Pyongyang to the table.

“We are not using a carrot to convince them to talk, we are using large stick. That is what they need to understand,” he said.

The North is subject to a series of UN Security Council sanctions over its banned nuclear and ballistic missile programmes.

The US has previously indicated Washington is open to direct talks, but Mr Tillerson stressed earlier this month that the ball was now in Pyongyang’s camp.

“We’ve said for some time it’s really up to the North Koreans to decide when they’re ready to engage with us in a sincere way, a meaningful way,” Mr Tillerson said on Feb 12.

“They know what has to be on the table for conversations.”

Washington says Pyongyang must take concrete steps towards denuclearisation before talks can begin, while South Korean President Moon Jae-in has argued for closer involvement to engage the North in talks.

Mr Moon last week received an invitation from Mr Kim for a summit in Pyongyang.

The invitation was extended by the North Korean leader’s younger sister, Kim Yo-jong, who was part of a high-level delegation attending the Winter Games in the South.