North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump look on
during the extended bilateral meeting in the Metropole hotel during the
second North Korea-US summit in Hanoi, Vietnam on February 28, 2019.
PHOTO | REUTERS
US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un
failed to reach an agreement on denuclearization of the Korean peninsula
at their summit in Vietnam on Thursday, the White House said.
Earlier,
both Trump and Kim had expressed hope for progress on improving
relations and on the key issue of denuclearisation, in their talks in
the Vietnamese capital, Hanoi.
“The two leaders
discussed various ways to advance denuclearisation and economic driven
concepts,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said.
“No agreement was reached at this time, but their respective teams look forward to meeting in the future.”
Trump
had been scheduled to hold a “joint agreement signing ceremony” with
Kim at the conclusion of their summit talks, according to an earlier
White House announcement.
Both leaders left the venue
of their talks, the French-colonial-era Metropole hotel, at 1.25 pm
(0625GMT), without attending a planned lunch together, and returned to
their hotels.
Trump is now due to hold a news conference at 2 pm. (0700 GMT).
News of the change in schedule sent South Korea’s currency lower and knocked regional stock markets.
Earlier Kim and Trump, seated across from each other at a conference table, appeared confident of progress.
“If
I’m not willing to do that, I won’t be here right now,” Kim told
reporters through an interpreter, when asked if he was ready to give up
his nuclear weapons.
Trump, responding to that, said: “That might be the best answer you’ve ever heard.”
Kim
did not elaborate on what “denuclearisation” would entail, but asked if
he was ready to take concrete steps, Kim said they had just been
talking about that.
While the United States is
demanding North Korea give up all of its nuclear and missile programs,
the North wants to see the removal of a US nuclear umbrella for its
Asian allies such as South Korea and Japan.
The two
leaders’ summit in Singapore in June, the first between a sitting US
president and a North Korean leader, produced a vague statement in which
Kim pledged to work toward denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula.
But there has been little progress since.
No comments :
Post a Comment