North Korea tells U.S. denuclearization talks may fall apart

August 28, 2018  13H:32 GMT/UTC/ZULU TIME

by Rachel Rubin, Coco Jiang, and Biodun Iginla, BBC News and Reuters, WASHINGTON/PYONGYANG. Coco Jiang is reporting undercover in Pyongyang.

WASHINGTON/PYONGYANG - North Korean officials have warned in a letter to the United States that denuclearization talks were “again at stake and may fall apart”, CNN reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter.

The letter was delivered directly to U.S Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and stated that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s government felt that the process could not move forward.

"The U.S. is still not ready to meet (North Korean) expectations in terms of taking a step forward to sign a peace treaty," CNN reported, citing sources. cnn.it/2MAI9AT

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The 1950-1953 Korean War ended in an armistice rather than a peace treaty, leaving U.S.-led U.N. forces technically still at war with North Korea.

The North has long made clear that it sees an official end to the state of war as crucial to lowering tensions on the Korean peninsula.

The United States has been reluctant to declare an end to the Korean War until after North Korea abandons its nuclear weapons program.

The Washington Post reported on Monday that U.S. President Donald Trump called off a visit to North Korea by Pompeo after the latter received a belligerent letter from a senior North Korean official just hours after the trip was announced last week.

FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un leave after signing documents that acknowledge the progress of the talks and pledge to keep momentum going, after their summit at the Capella Hotel on Sentosa island in Singapore June 12, 2018. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo

CNN reported that the letter was sent by the former head of North Korea’s spy agency, Kim Yong Chol, but it was not known how it was sent. The Washington Post said North Korea had been increasingly communicating through its U.N. mission.

CNN reported that the letter also mentioned that if a compromise could not be reached and the nascent talks crumbles, North Korea could resume “nuclear and missile activities”.

On Sunday, North Korea’s state media accused the United States of “double-dealing” and “hatching a criminal plot” but did not mention Pompeo’s canceled visit.

The Washington Post said the exact contents of the message were unclear, but it was sufficiently belligerent that Trump and Pompeo decided to call off the planned trip.

The trip had been announced the previous day for this week and Pompeo had intended to introduce a newly named special envoy, Stephen Biegun, to his North Korean counterparts.

The White House referred queries on the Washington Post report to the State Department, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In cancelling Pompeo’s trip, Trump publicly acknowledged for the first time that his effort to get North Korea to denuclearize had stalled since his June 12 summit with its leader, Kim Jong Un {nL2N1VF10N]

U.S. intelligence and defense officials have repeatedly expressed doubts about North Korea’s willingness to give up its nuclear weapons and did not expect Pompeo’s trip to yield positive results.

North Korea official in New York. for talks on summit, differences remain

May 31, 2018  05H:32  GMT/UTC/ZULU TIME

by Biodun Iginla, BBC News and Reuters, New York

NEW YORK - A senior North Korean official made a rare visit to the United States on Wednesday for talks about a possible summit between the leaders of the two countries but the sides appeared far apart on the central issue of Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons.

Kim Yong Chol, a close aide of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and vice chairman of the ruling Workers’ Party’s Central Committee, arrived at New York’s John F. Kennedy airport on a flight from Beijing. He was later seen entering a hotel in midtown Manhattan.

Kim Yong Chol is due to meet with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday and Thursday to discuss whether to go ahead with an unprecedented meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim.

The summit, originally planned for June 12 in Singapore, has been cast in doubt as the two countries - which have technically been at war since the 1950s - test each other’s diplomatic mettle.

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As the U.S. and North Korean officials prepared for their first encounter in New York on Wednesday evening, Pompeo repeated the Trump administration’s demands.

“Looking forward to meeting with Kim Yong Chol in New York to discuss @Potus potential summit with Chairman Kim. We are committed to the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula @StateDept,” Pompeo said in a Twitter post.

Trump last week called off the summit after North Korea expressed anger at comments by senior U.S. officials. But Trump later said he was reconsidering his position and U.S., North Korean and South Korean officials have gone ahead with summit preparations.

The White House said on Wednesday that negotiations at the demilitarized zone along the border between North and South Korea for the summit were going well and that it expects the historic meeting to take place on June 12.

Separately on Wednesday at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, Admiral Harry Harris, the outgoing head of U.S. Pacific Command who is Trump’s pick to be the ambassador to South Korea, said North Korea remained the United States’ most imminent threat. “And a nuclear-capable North Korea with missiles that can reach the United States is unacceptable,” Harris said.

A U.S. official said negotiations about the summit’s agenda have so far been slow going, and the two fundamental issues, the definition of North Korean denuclearization and whether both sides would take actions at the same time or separately, remained unsettled.

‘DENUCLEARIZATION’

Trump has sworn not to allow North Korea to develop nuclear missiles that could hit the United States and wants North Korea to “denuclearize,” or get rid of its nuclear arms.

But the leadership in Pyongyang is believed to regard nuclear weapons as crucial to its survival and has rejected unilaterally disarming.

The U.S. official said the U.S. position remained that Pyongyang must agree to complete denuclearization before it can receive any financial assistance, such as relaxation of some economic sanctions, new food or other aid, or new investment, and that the degree of assistance would depend on the pace and extent of Pyongyang’s actions.

North Korean envoy Kim Yong Chol (C), departs from a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in New York, U.S., May 30, 2018. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

North Korea’s position going into the meetings with Pompeo in New York, meanwhile, was that a pledge of denuclearization alone should open the way to economic relief, said the official, who is familiar with the talks and spoke on condition of anonymity.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency quoted Seoul’s Unification Minister Cho Myoung-gyon as saying in a speech on Wednesday that the differences between North Korea and the United States on the denuclearization issue remained “quite significant” and it would not be easy to narrow the gap.

However, Cho added that the engagement of the leaders of the two countries meant “chances are high that common ground can be found.”

Kim Yong Chol is the most senior North Korean official to meet top officials for talks in the United States since Jo Myong Rok, a vice marshal, met then-President Bill Clinton at the White House in 2000.

Slideshow (10 Images)

A former military spy chief, he has played a central role in the thaw in relations over the past six months between North Korea and South Korea, as well as the United States.

During his tenure as a senior intelligence official, Kim was accused by South Korea of masterminding deadly attacks on a South Korean navy ship and an island in 2010. He was linked by U.S intelligence to a cyber attack on Sony Pictures in 2014.

North Korea denied any involvement in the attack on the ship and on Sony Pictures.

North Korea defends its nuclear and missile programs as a deterrent against what it sees as U.S. ambitions to overthrow its leadership and unite the Korean Peninsula. The United States stations 28,500 troops in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-1953 Korean War.