President Donald Trump on Wednesday said US relations with North Korea are making “tremendous progress” from the days before his presidency when the two countries appeared close to “going to war.”
Trump said a recent letter from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un confirmed the positive track, which he said has seen the hardline communist country promise to halt its nuclear missile test program and mount a combined bid with South Korea for the 2032 Olympic Games.
“We’re making tremendous progress with respect to North Korea. Prior to becoming president, it looked like we were going to war with North Korea and now we have a lot of progress,” Trump told journalists at the White House.
“A lot of tremendous things but very importantly no missile testing, no nuclear testing.”
“The relationships, I have to tell you, at least on a personal basis, are very good. It is very much calmed down,” Trump said.
An unprecedented June summit in Singapore between Trump and Kim aimed to break a decades-long standoff between the two countries, which have never formally ended the 1950-1953 Korean War.
However, critics accused Trump of naively playing into the North Korean’s hands by giving him credibility with little concrete in return.
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo welcomed Pyongyang’s “important commitments” made by Pyongyang during Wednesday’s inter-Korean summit, adding Washington was ready to begin negotiating immediately to achieve the denuclearization of North Korea “by January 2021.”
In a statement, Pompeo said he spoke with his North Korean counterpart Wednesday morning and invited him to meet in New York next week on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.
The statement came after the North’s leader Kim Jong Un agreed to make a historic visit to Seoul soon and close a missile testing site in front of international inspectors in a meeting with the South’s President Moon Jae-in.
Progress on the key issue of the North’s nuclear arsenal was limited, but the two signed a document to strengthen ties between the two halves of the divided peninsula.
Building on a growing rapprochement, they agreed to create a facility to hold family reunions at any time, work towards joining up road and rail links, and mount a combined bid for the 2032 Olympics.
“On the basis of these important commitments, the United States is prepared to engage immediately in negotiations to transform U.S.-DPRK relations,” said Pompeo.
In addition to Pompeo’s meeting with North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho, “we have invited North Korean representatives to meet our Special Representative for North Korea, Stephen Biegun, in Vienna, Austria at the earliest opportunity,” the statement continued.
“This will mark the beginning of negotiations to transform U.S.-DPRK relations through the process of rapid denuclearization of North Korea, to be completed by January 2021, as committed by Chairman Kim, and to construct a lasting and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula.”
Kim’s trip to Seoul would be the first by a Northern leader since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War, when hostilities ceased with an armistice rather than a peace treaty, leaving them technically in a state of war.
In their agreement, the North also said it would “permanently close” a missile engine testing site and launch facility in Tongchang-ri “in the presence of experts from relevant nations.”
