Korea talks a waste, Trump says
Tillerson disclosed U.S. still had direct channels with North
WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday dismissed the prospect of talks with North Korea as a waste of time a day after his secretary of state said the United States was maintaining open lines of communication with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
“I told Rex Tillerson, our wonderful Secretary of State, that he is wasting his time trying to negotiate with Little Rocket Man,” Trump wrote on Twitter, using his nickname for Kim.
Trump, who has traded insults and threats with Kim in recent weeks amid tensions over Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs, later tweeted that his White House predecessors, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama, had all “failed” on North Korea by “Being nice to Rocket Man.”
“So why would it work now?” he asked.
Kim succeeded his father, Kim Jong Il, as North Korean leader in 2011, during Obama’s administration. Previous presidents negotiated with Pyongyang but failed to prevent it from pressing ahead with its internationally condemned weapons programs.
Tillerson disclosed Saturday that the United States was directly communicating with North Korea on its nuclear and missile programs but that Pyongyang had shown no interest in dialog.
“Save your energy Rex, we’ll do what has to be done!” Trump said.
Tillerson said during a trip to China that the United States had multiple direct channels of communication with Pyongyang, the first such disclosure from the Trump administration, and that it was probing North Korea to see whether it was interested in dialogue.
An administration official, asked for clarification about Trump’s Sunday morning tweets, played down the significance of the communication channels.
“At a time when North Korea is continuing its provocations, the president does not think now is the time to negotiate with them,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.