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White House Expects N Korea Summit to Take Place

White House Expects N Korea Summit to Take Place
folder_openUnited States access_time6 years ago
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The White House said Monday that it fully expects an unprecedented meeting between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to take place, even though Pyongyang has yet to comment publicly on the possibility.

White House Expects N Korea Summit to Take Place

Meanwhile, a South Korean delegation that visited North Korea last week said Kim expressed a wish to meet Trump and South Korea's president to discuss denuclearization.

For its part, North Korean media reported the South Korean visit without mentioning further details of the talks.

Asked if the North Korean silence meant there was a chance the meeting between Trump and Kim would not take place, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said: "We fully expect that it will. The offer was made and we've accepted."

"North Korea made several promises and we hope that they would stick to those promises and if so the meeting will go on as planned. We are continuing to prepare on a number of levels," she told a regular briefing.

Earlier, South Korea said North Korea's silence on summits with both the United States and South Korea was probably due to caution in preparing for the meetings, while US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Washington expected to hear directly from Pyongyang.

He said several steps would be necessary to agree the location and scope of the talks.

Tillerson, who has cut short his first trip to Africa as secretary of state to return to Washington Tuesday, a day ahead of schedule, did not elaborate.

In an unexpected move last week, Trump agreed to hold a first-ever meeting with Kim, which South Korea said would take place by the end of May after a North-South summit in April.

News of possible talks has been a dramatic turnaround from fears of war over North Korea's development of nuclear-tipped missiles capable of hitting the United States.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team

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