WEB DESK
US President Donald Trump will not meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un unless Pyongyang takes concrete actions, the White House said yesterday. This came after Washington faced criticism for agreeing to talks that would boost Kim’s standing.
White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told a news briefing that the President will not have the meeting without seeing concrete steps and concrete actions take place by North Korea. Sanders did not specify what actions North Korea needed to take, and a White House official later said she was not intending to set new conditions for talks with Kim.
“They have made some major promises. They have made promises to denuclearize. They have made promises to stop nuclear and missile testing,” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Friday. “We’re not going to have this meeting take place until we see concrete actions that match the words and the rhetoric of North Korea.”
Sanders’ comments Friday cast doubt on the President’s much-ballyhooed agreement to meet the North Korean leader, with the White House appearing to impose new conditions that were not apparent a day earlier. The South Korean national security adviser said Kim is “committed to denuclearization,” but there was no indication that North Korea had promised to take steps toward denuclearization in order to secure a meeting with the US President.
The United States has long said it wants any talks to aim at Pyongyang abandoning its nuclear weapons and missile programs. Hopes for a breakthrough with North Korea rose on Thursday when Trump said he was prepared to hold an unprecedented meeting with Kim.