Trump keen to meet Kim after China visit
WASHINGTON. - US President Donald Trump has said he is keen to meet Kim Jong-un after being told the North Korean leader’s trip to China “went very well”.
But Trump said maximum sanctions and pressure on North Korea would continue ahead of proposed talks in May.
He added that denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula was now a possibility.
The comments follow Kim’s meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping, in his first known foreign trip since taking office in 2011.
Kim and his wife were greeted with a banquet and a guard of honour, with the North Korean leader reportedly saying he was committed to denuclearisation.
China is North Korea’s main economic ally.
Yesterday, Trump welcomed news of progress following the talks between the two leaders in Beijing after days of speculation.
“Now there is a good chance that Kim Jong-un will do what is right for his people and for humanity,” Mr Trump posted, adding in the next tweet that Mr Kim also “looks forward to his meeting with me”.
Trump’s agreement to hold an unprec- edented summit with Kim astonished many observers.
The announcement, which would make Trump the first sitting US president to meet a North Korean leader, came after months of hostility and a string of North Korean missile tests.
An initial statement from the South Korean delegation said a meeting had been agreed and would take place by May - but no place or date has officially been set.
News of the major breakthrough in tensions was met with concern in the US, with reports that Trump had made the decision without consulting key figures in his administration.
However, Trump later tweeted that a deal with North Korea was “very much in the making”.
North Korea’s KCNA news agency called the visit “a milestone” in improving bilateral ties.
Kim’s arrival and departure were shrouded in secrecy.
China said the visit was “unofficial” so there was no announcement of it in advance, prompting speculation about who was on the train when it was spotted arriving.