Is N. Korea supporting Trump?

/Yonhap

By Lee Jin-a

North Korean media praised U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as a “wise politician” and “far-sighted candidate” while denouncing Hilary Clinton of the Democratic Party as “dull,” the Guardian newspaper reported on Tuesday.

In an editorial, Han Yong-mook, a Chinese scholar specializing in North Korea, welcomed Trump’s offer to speak directly with the military state’s leader, Kim Jong-un, and said if Trump became U.S. president, the state would be able to fulfill its “Yankee Go Home” policy.

Trump suggested in March that he would withdraw U.S. troops from South Korea if Seoul did not pay more toward the cost of keeping U.S. troops on the peninsula.

Last month, he also said he was willing to talk with the North Korean leader to stop Pyongyang’s nuclear program.

“The president for whom U.S. citizens must vote is not that dull Hillary _ who claimed to adapt the Iranian model to resolve nuclear issues on the Korean Peninsula _ but Trump, who spoke of holding a direct conversation with North Korea,” Han wrote.

Analysts told the Guardian that even though the editorial was not officially from Pyongyang, it reflected the Kim regime’s views.

While not supporting Trump as strongly as Han, Rodong Shinmun, the North Korean ruling party’s official mouthpiece, said Wednesday that Trump’s comments about withdrawing U.S. troops was causing anxiety in South Korea.

It said the South Korean government “should stop living as a servant of foreign forces and come back to the side of the Korean nation.”