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US President Donald Trump talks to reporters at the White House before heading to his presidential retreat in Camp David, Maryland, on Jan. 6. (AP)
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Two leaders have yet to reach compromise on key agenda points
On Jan. 6, US President Donald Trump said that the US and North Korea were deliberating the location of their second summit and that the results would soon be announced. Since the beginning of the year, the leaders of the two sides have exchanged a flurry of positive messages, boosting expectations about the second summit. When reporters at the White House asked Trump before he departed for the presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland, whether he had a place in mind for the location of the second North Korea-US summit, he said, “We are negotiating a location. It will be announced probably in the not-too-distant future.” “They have made it very clear — in fact, they’ve actually said to the media that they would like to meet. And they do want to meet, and we want to meet, and we’ll see what happens,” Trump went on to say. “And again, no rockets. We’re doing very well [with North Korea]. I’ve indirectly spoken to Chairman Kim.” “You would, right now, be in a nice, big, fat war in Asia with North Korea if I wasn’t elected President,” Trump said. “And now we have a very good dialogue going.” Vietnam, Indonesia, Mongolia and Hawaii possible candidates Trump’s repeated remarks are focusing attention on whether the announcement of the time and location of the summit are actually imminent. On Jan. 3, CNN quoted a source as saying that the Trump administration had sent advance teams to several potential sites at the end of 2018 and that the US preferred a country in Asia. Some of the locations that have been mentioned are Vietnam, Indonesia, Mongolia and the US state of Hawaii. “I am confident that in the next short period of time President Trump and Chairman Kim will get the chance to meet again,” US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said during an interview with Fox News. “We have set the conditions where we can make real progress when Chairman Kim and President Trump meet and take down the threat to the United States and to the world.” But there are no indications that North Korea and the US have reached a compromise about key points on the agenda, including North Korea’s denuclearization and the US’ corresponding measures, or that high-level or working-level meetings are underway in search of such a compromise. That said, some analysts believe that Trump intends to use North Korea’s willingness to freeze its nuclear program to achieve progress in the negotiations. During his New Year’s address, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said that the North had promised not to produce, test, use or proliferate nuclear weapons and had been taking practical measures toward that end, and some analysts believe that this can be regarded as expressing the willingness to implement a full nuclear freeze. On Jan. 6, Trump said, “The sanctions remain in full force, in effect. And they will until we have some very positive proof,” which can be taken as a somewhat more flexible viewpoint than his previous position that denuclearization must be completed before sanctions can be lifted. Another option is for North Korea and the US to announce the time and location of the summit first and negotiate its agenda later, as they did during their first summit. But that plan would entail some risks. During the first summit, the very fact of the two leaders meeting was quite significant, but the second summit has to be accompanied by concrete progress on the agenda. If the two sides are unable to narrow their differences on denuclearization and corresponding measures, Trump and Kim may end up exchanging friendly rhetoric for a longer period of time. On Sept. 25 of last year, Trump said that the second summit would be held in the near future and would soon be announced, and on Dec. 1, he said that three locations were under consideration for a summit to be held in January or February. By Hwang Joon-bum, Washington correspondent, and Kim Ji-eun, staff reporter Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]
