Top North Korean officials will hand-deliver a letter to President Trump in Washington on Friday from their leader, Kim Jong-un, as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo reported “real progress” toward resuming plans for a high-stakes denuclearization summit.
North Korean Vice Chairman Kim Yong-chol and a delegation from Pyongyang were headed from New York City to meet with Mr. Trump at the White House in what will be the first visit by officials from the isolated communist nation in 18 years.
They are bearing a letter that is likely a response to Mr. Trump’s overture for Kim Jong-un to “call me or write” if Pyongyang decides to tone down its hostile rhetoric toward the U.S., angry words that prompted the president to cancel the summit last week.
After Mr. Pompeo wrapped up several hours of talks with the North Koreans in New York over two days, Mr. Trump expressed hope that a meeting with Kim Jong-un still could take place on June 12 in Singapore as the U.S. seeks to persuade Pyongyang to give up all aspects of its nuclear weapons program.
“Hopefully, we’ll have a meeting on the 12th,” Mr. Trump told reporters. “But I want it to be meaningful. It doesn’t mean it gets all done at one meeting; maybe you have to have a second or a third. And maybe we’ll have none.”
Mr. Pompeo, the former CIA director, emerged from his third round of talks with Kim Yong-chol, a close adviser to Kim Jong-un with an extensive background in clandestine operations, sounding optimistic that the summit is back on track.
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“It does no good if we are in a place where we don’t think there is real opportunity to place them together,” Mr. Pompeo said of the two nations’ leaders. “We have made real progress toward that in the last 72 hours.”
He would not confirm that the summit is definitely on schedule for Singapore on June 12 and couldn’t say whether a decision would be made after Mr. Trump reads the letter from Kim Jong-un.
Despite the upbeat messaging in the U.S., Kim Jong-un, in a meeting with Russia’s foreign minister on Thursday, complained that the U.S. is trying to spread its influence in the region. The comment may complicate the summit plans.
“As we move to adjust to the political situation in the face of U.S. hegemonism, I am willing to exchange detailed and in-depth opinions with your leadership and hope to do so moving forward,” Mr. Kim told Sergey Lavrov.
China, North Korea’s main trading partner and a key ally, said it supported and encouraged the “emerging good faith” between the U.S. and North Korea.
“At the same time as working to achieve the goal of denuclearization, we should also build long-term and effective initiatives to keep peace on the Korean Peninsula,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in Beijing.
Kim Yong-chol, vice chairman of the North Korean ruling party’s central committee, was allowed into the U.S. despite being on a sanctions list. North Korean officials are not normally allowed to travel outside the New York area.
He is the most senior North Korean visitor to the U.S. since Vice Marshal Jo Myong-rok visited Washington in 2000 to meet with President Clinton and Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright. That was the last time the two sides, which are technically at war, attempted to arrange a summit.
North Korea, whose nuclear ambitions have been a source of tension for decades, has made advances in missile technology in recent years, but Mr. Trump has sworn not to allow Pyongyang to develop nuclear missiles that could hit the U.S.
The administration has been urging North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, potentially in return for loosening economic sanctions, humanitarian and other aid, and improved ties with South Korea.
Mr. Pompeo said the path to better relations won’t be easy.
“This is going to be a process that will take days and weeks to work our way through,” he said at a news conference. “There will be tough points. There will be difficult times.”
On the central question for the summit, Mr. Pompeo stopped short of saying that Pyongyang is committed to giving up its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.
“We’ve had lots of conversations around that,” he said. “I believe they are contemplating a path forward, where they can make a strategic shift, one that their country has not been prepared to make before.”
He added, “I’ve had some difficult conversations with them. They’ve given it right back to me.”
Since Mr. Trump canceled the summit, talks have been progressing rapidly on several fronts. South Korean President Moon Jae-in met with Mr. Kim. Other U.S. and North Korean teams have been meeting in various locations, including Singapore.
Mr. Pompeo said the proposed summit “offers a historic opening for President Trump and Chairman Kim to boldly lead the United States and the DPRK into a new era of peace, prosperity and security.”
“Our two countries face a pivotal moment in our relationship in which it could be nothing short of tragic to let this opportunity to go to waste,” Mr. Pompeo said.
He said he has been clear in all negotiations that Mr. Trump’s position is “the complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
For decades, North Korea’s regime has viewed the development of nuclear weapons as the key to its security and its survival. Mr. Pompeo said the main challenge is still to convince North Korea that Mr. Trump doesn’t want regime change in Pyongyang.
“This administration completely understands how hard this problem is,” Mr. Pompeo said. “There is a long history where North Korea has viewed its nuclear program as providing the security that it needed for the regime. The effort now is to come to a set of understandings which convince the North Koreans of what President Trump has said.”
• This article is based in part on wire service reports.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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