Moon, Trump hold last minute talks on US-North Korea summit
South Korean President Moon Jae-in talks to the U.S. President Donald Trump on the phone at Cheong Wa Dae, June 11, ahead of the American leader's summit with North Korean counterpart Kim Jong-un the following day in Singapore. / Yonhap
By Kim Bo-eun
President Moon Jae-in and U.S. President Donald Trump discussed, Monday, ways to hold a successful summit between the latter and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
Trump also told Moon about the working-level negotiations that have taken place between the U.S. and North Korea, in a 40-minute phone call a day ahead of the summit.
Earlier, in a meeting with aides, Moon said he expects bold decisions to be made by the leaders of North Korea and the United States in the summit today.
“We hope for a big deal on ending hostilities and denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula to be reached through the summit,” Moon said in the meeting at Cheong Wa Dae.
Moon said a single summit would not be able to resolve all issues, and cited the need for “sincere efforts among the Koreas and the U.S. and continuous cooperation of neighboring states until the completion of the process.” He added inter-Korean dialogue was important in the process.
North Korea and the U.S. will likely reach an agreement on the framework of the former’s denuclearization at the summit but negotiations on details will also continue.
Working-level talks continued in Singapore a day before the summit, signaling that the two states still have differences over key points of any deal.
Delegations led by U.S. Ambassador to the Philippines Sung Kim, and North Korea’s Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui continued negotiations which took place earlier at the truce village of Panmunjeom. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo referred to the working-level negotiations as “substantive and detailed meetings” in a Twitter post Monday.
The U.S. appears firm in its stance of North Korea’s complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement (CVID) of its nuclear program. “We remain committed to CVID of the Korean Peninsula,” Pompeo added in the post.
Speculation is that Trump may call for North Korea’s commitment to CVID to be put down in writing.
Meanwhile, North Korea referred to “new relations between North Korea and the U.S. according to the requirements of a changed era,” in a report Monday by its Korean Central News Agency.
This is part of guaranteeing the security of the North Korean regime, which is what Pyongyang has been calling for as a condition of its denuclearization.
By establishing diplomatic relations with the U.S. and also by ending the 1950-53 Korean War that ended in an armistice – and signing a peace treaty with the relevant nations – North Korea hopes to remove security threats to its regime. It could seek for the security of its regime to be backed by U.S. legislation by getting approval from the U.S. Congress, so that this would be ensured even after changes in the U.S. administration.
While North Korea and the U.S. may agree on denuclearization in exchange for regime security, they will likely negotiate the timeframe and method of denuclearization in talks to follow.
Earlier reports said the U.S. is calling for North Korea’s nuclear weapons to be shipped out of the country, and to verify the process of denuclearization the U.S. is also likely to require an IAEA presence in North Korea. These calls will not likely be easily accepted by North Korea.
Conditions of the deal may depend on the rewards the U.S. is willing to provide. Aside from regime security, North Korea also wants economic incentives such as its sanctions being lifted. Earlier, the U.S. stated it is open to investment in and trade with North Korea if it achieves complete denuclearization.