Lee Min-hyung joined The Korea Times in 2014 and has worked as a journalist mainly in Korea’s finance, tech and automotive industry. He specializes in content creation, breaking news and in-depth analysis currently on transportation and mobility. You can reach him via mhlee@koreatimes.co.kr.
Kim Jong-un returns home
By Lee Min-hyung
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North Korean leader Kim Jong-un
By Lee Min-hyung
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un returned home Tuesday after ending his failed summit with U.S. President Donald Trump and other diplomatic appointments in Vietnam's capital Hanoi.
According to the North's Korea Central News Agency (KCNA), Kim's private train arrived in Pyongyang at around 3 a.m. Tuesday.
It took about 60 hours for Kim to arrive in the North's capital after he left Dong Dang train station in Vietnam, Saturday.
Some critics predicted the young dictator would visit Beijing for another summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping en route to Pyongyang. But Kim did not make any stops on his way home.
“A crowd of people were waiting for Kim's arrival to celebrate his successful summit with the U.S. and Vietnam,” the KCNA said.
Kim also responded by delivering a warm-hearted greeting to the people of the North upon his arrival in Pyongyang, the regime's state-run media reported.
It went on to speak highly of Kim's latest overseas trip by saying: “Kim leads the global politics due to his outstanding diplomatic ability.”
This ended his 10-day-long trip to Vietnam. Kim departed for Hanoi on Feb. 23 by traversing China via train.
Kim's every move has since made global headlines, as the trip was for the second landmark summit with Trump.
Expectations were that Trump and Kim might sign at least a “small deal” in their talks on denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. This was because the second summit was arranged to resolve their months-long deadlock on the nuclear disarmament of the North after their first meeting in Singapore last June.
The pre-summit atmosphere looked optimistic, as both sides held rounds of working-level and high-level talks to fine-tune their differences ahead of the leadership meeting.
But the second Washington-Pyongyang summit ended up in failure, with Trump and Kim signing no deals over the sanctions imposed on the regime.
The North urged the U.S. to grant partial sanctions exemptions on the regime in exchange for its steps for denuclearization, such as the dismantling of the Yongbyon nuclear complex.
But Washington did not accept the proposal, and with Trump and Kim failing to narrow their differences on the agenda, both sides were unable to sign the much-anticipated “Hanoi Declaration” during their second meeting.
Despite the summit breakdown, the North's media did not report any details on the latest summit, only calling the Trump-Kim meeting “successful.”