U.S. envoy for North Korea to visit South Korea for three-way meet: Kyodo

[June 16, 2021]    SEOUL (Reuters) - The newly appointed U.S. envoy for North Korea, Sung Kim, will make his first visit to neighbouring South Korea this week for a possible three-way meeting with counterparts from Seoul and Tokyo, the Kyodo news agency said on Wednesday.

U.S. State Department official Sung Kim stands after U.S. President Joe Biden announced Kim will serve as a special U.S. envoy for North Korea during a joint news conference with South Korea's President Moon Jae-in after a day of meetings at the White House, in Washington, U.S. May 21, 2021. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

The visit, from Saturday to June 24, comes after President Joe Biden and South Korean President Moon Jae-in held their first summit in May, injecting fresh urgency into efforts to engage the North in talks on its nuclear weapons.

Kyodo said arrangements were being made for the visit during which the officials of the three nations would discuss the future direction of the Biden administration’s attempts to open dialogue with North Korea in pursuit of denuclearisation.

Takehiro Funakoshi, director-general of the Japanese foreign ministry’s Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, will participate, as will Noh Kyu-duk, the South Korean foreign ministry's special representative for Korean peninsula peace and security affairs.

Sung Kim, appointed by Biden last month, is a Korean-American diplomat who had the same role under President Barack Obama, and helped set up former President Donald Trump's summits with the North's leader, Kim Jong Un.

Kim Jong Un has said his country's economy improved this year but urged measures to tackle the "tense" food situation caused by the coronavirus pandemic and typhoons last year.

(Reporting by Sangmi Cha in Seoul and Elaine Lies in Tokyo; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

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