Trump dangles prospect of North Korean
leader visit if summit successful
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[June 08, 2018]
By James Oliphant
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President
Donald Trump on Thursday held out the prospect of inviting North Korean
leader Kim Jong Un to the White House if he deemed next week's summit a
success while also signaling he was willing to walk away if he thought
talks did not go well.
At a White House news conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo
Abe, Trump also repeated what he said last week that it was possible he
and Kim could sign an agreement to end the 1950-53 Korean War, which was
concluded only with a truce, not a peace treaty.
"We could sign an agreement, as you know that would be a first step ...
We're looking at it, we're talking about it with a lot of other people,"
Trump told reporters. "That's probably the easy part. The hard part
remains after that."
Trump added that he hoped someday U.S. relations with Kim's secretive
Pyongyang government could be normalized.
The main issue for the June 12 summit in Singapore is the U.S. demand
for North Korea to abandon a nuclear weapons program that now threatens
the United States.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2018/Jun/08/images/ads/current/makeitsew_sda_PROM_2018.png)
North Korea has rejected giving up its arsenal unilaterally and defends
its nuclear and missile programs as a deterrent against what it sees as
U.S. aggression. The United States stations 28,500 troops in South
Korea, a legacy of the Korean War.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday reemphasized
Washington's stance going into the talks.
Pompeo said Trump will reject anything short of "complete, verifiable
and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
"President Trump is hopeful. But he's also going into the summit with
his eyes wide open," Pompeo said at a White House briefing after the
Trump-Abe news conference.
Pompeo, however, added that the U.S. would work to guarantee North
Korea's security should it denuclearize. Trump "is prepared to ensure a
DPRK free of its weapons of mass destruction is also a secure North
Korea," Pompeo said.
Pompeo plans to stay in the region following the summit to meet with
officials from Japan and South Korea and to travel to China, an
important North Korean ally, to discuss the next steps involving
Pyongyang.
TRUMP WARNING
Trump told reporters on Thursday he would quit the talks if he felt he
must, and would ramp up U.S. sanctions pressure on North Korea if the
talks did not go well.
"I am totally prepared to walk away," he said.
On the other hand, Trump said he might extend an invitation to Kim to
Washington.
"Certainly if it goes well. I think it would be well received," he said
in answer to a question. "I think he would look at it very favorably so
I think that could happen."
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President Donald Trump holds a Make America Great Again rally at
Nashville Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S., May
29, 2018. REUTERS/Leah Millis
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Pompeo, who has twice met with Kim in Pyongyang, said he believes
the North Korean leader is prepared to take "bold" steps to alter
the course of his nation.
"He has indicated to me personally that he is prepared to
denuclearize," Pompeo said. "That he understands that the current
model doesn't work, that he's prepared to denuclearize and that two,
he understands that we can't do it the way we've done it before.
That is has to be big and bold and we have to agree to making major
changes."
Asked whether the two sides had narrowed their differences on how
they defined denuclearization, Pompeo said they had, but he declined
to give details.
U.S. officials said Kim had indicated he was willing to make a
pledge to denuclearize, but had never made it clear if this would
mean simply halting development of the weapons program where it
stands or also disposing of its existing nuclear arsenal.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they expect
that the Singapore summit will yield nothing more than a vague "end
of war declaration" and leave the main issues on defining
denuclearization for further negotiations.
North Korea has argued for a "phased" approach to denuclearization
of the entire Korean peninsula, which in the past has also meant
removal of the U.S. nuclear umbrella protecting Washington's allies
South Korea and Japan.
At the meeting with Abe, Trump said he promised to raise with Kim
the subject of Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea, after Abe
focused on the issue during an earlier conversation.
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"He talked about it long and hard and passionately and I will follow
his wishes and we will be discussing that with North Korea
absolutely, absolutely," Trump said.
(Reporting by Roberta Rampton, James Oliphant, John Walcott and
David Brunnstrom; Writing by David Alexander and Eric Walsh; Editing
by Richard Chang and Grant McCool)
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