President Trump is open to discussions with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un surrounding the country’s potential denuclearization, a White House official told Fox News.
“President Trump in his first term held three historic summits with North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un that stabilized the Korean Peninsula and achieved the first-ever leader-level agreement on denuclearization,” the official explained. “The President retains those objectives and remains open to engaging with Leader Kim to achieve a fully de-nuclearized North Korea.”
The statement comes as the North Korean leader’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, warned the United States against engaging in talks surrounding denuclearization.
“Shortly ago, a person in authority of the White House said that the president stabilized the situation on the Korean peninsula and reached the first top-level agreement on denuclearization through the three DPRK-U.S. summit meetings during his first term of office and that he is still open to dialogue with the DPRK leader for achieving the complete denuclearization of the DPRK,” Kim said in a statement this week. “We do not want to give any meaning to the U.S. side’s unilateral assessment of the past DPRK-U.S. dialogue.”
“The DPRK is open to any option in defending its present national position,” she added, going on to declare that she does not want to “deny the fact that the personal relationship between the head of our state and the present U.S. president is not bad.”
In a message honoring the end of the Korean War, Trump highlighted his first administration’s “maximum pressure campaign” on North Korea for denuclearization.
“Although the evils of communism still persist in Asia, American and South Korean forces remain united in an ironclad alliance to this day,” Trump said. “Guided by my Administration’s foreign policy of peace through strength, we remain steadfastly committed to safeguarding the Korean Peninsula and working together for the noble causes of safety, stability, prosperity, and peace.”
