US President Donald Trump signaled his
determination Friday to resume denuclearization talks with North Korea's
Kim Jong Un, dismissing concerns that Pyongyang's newest tests of
powerful short-range missiles pose a regional threat.
Trump said he had just received a "beautiful letter" from Kim expressing
Pyongyang's anger over US-South Korean joint war games, which spurred
the series of four missile tests in two weeks.
While other US officials called the launches "provocations," Trump said
he agreed with the North Korean leader and was hoping to meet him again,
with talks having been frozen for months.
"I got a very beautiful letter from Kim Jong Un yesterday," Trump said. "It was a very positive letter."
"He wasn't happy with the war games," Trump said, referring to new
military exercises between US forces and the South Korean military that
began this week.
"As you know, I've never liked it either. I've never been a fan. And you know why? I don't like paying for it."
- Solemn warning -
It was a generous response to Kim, whose nuclear-armed government called
the missile launches a "solemn warning" over the joint war games that
began this week.
The drills were a "flagrant violation" of the diplomatic process between Pyongyang, Washington and Seoul, Kim's government said.
Trump's response also contrasted with his tough words for Washignton's
key East Asia allies, who were locked in a searing trade row.
"South Korea and Japan are fighting all the time," he said. "They have
to get along with each other. If they don't get along, what are we
doing?"
- Talks faltered after Singapore -
Trump has appeared determined to secure a denuclearization agreement
with North Korea ahead of the November 2020 US presidential elections
despite faltering talks since he first met Kim in a historic
ice-breaking summit in Singapore in June 2018.
At the time the US temporarily froze military exercises with South Korea
and Trump claimed Kim had agreed to give up his newly-acquired nuclear
weapons and long-range ballistic missiles.
But Pyongyang has maintained that the United States must lift its
economic embargo and sanctions on the country to make any progress in
nuclear talks.
Yet even after their abortive second summit in Hanoi in February, Trump has been loath to criticize the North Korean leader.
In June he offered an olive branch by meeting Kim in the Panmunjon truce
village on the North Korea-South Korea border, the first sitting US
president ever to step inside the North.
And on Friday, he said the missile launches weren't important.
"I'll say it again. There have been no nuclear tests. The missile tests
have all been short-range. No ballistic missile tests, no long-range
missiles," Trump said.
- Missile 'provocations' -
But the broader Trump administration's position is less enthusiastic.
After Pyongyang's fourth missile launch early this week, Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo said Washington was ready to resume talks and that
their strategy for the "full, final denuclearization of North Korea" had
not changed.
A senior State Department official who refused to be named told
journalists last week however that the missile tests were an impediment
to peace.
"The missile launches, any kind of provocations, are not helpful to advancing the cause of diplomacy," the official said.
The official said there was a unified message going to the North Koreans
from China and Russia that they need to "cease the provocations,
reengage in diplomacy to achieve complete denuclearization."
Meanwhile, the adminsitration's lead North Korea negotiator, Stephen
Biegun, could step down after just one year to take a new diplomatic
job, media reports said this week.
Critics say Trump, in his desire for a deal, is allowing Kim too much ground.
"Kim is playing him masterfully," by launching missiles one day and then
flattering Trump with a letter just days later, said Vipin Narang, a
Massachusetts Institute of Tehcnology profressor who follows US-North
Korea nuclear talks closely.
Kim "can run this play indefinitely because it always works."
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