North Korea yesterday said that it is running out of patience with the US over what it described as hostile policies and unilateral disarmament demands, adding that a close personal relationship between the leaders alone would not be enough to prevent nuclear diplomacy from derailing.
In a statement published by the official Korean Central News Agency, senior North Korean official Kim Yong-chol said there has been no substantial progress in relations, despite warm ties between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump.
The persisting hostility means “there can be the exchange of fire at any moment,” Kim Yong-chol said.
Photo: AP
The Trump administration would be “seriously mistaken” if it ignores an end-of-year deadline set by Kim Jong-un to propose mutually acceptable terms for a deal to salvage nuclear negotiations, he said.
The North issued a similar statement on Thursday that was attributed to veteran diplomat Kim Kye-gwan.
He criticized US officials for maintaining a “Cold War mentality and ideological prejudice” and urged Washington to act “wisely” through the end of the year.
“My hope is that the diplomatic adage that there is neither permanent foe nor permanent friend does not change into the one that there is a permanent foe, but no permanent friend,” Kim Yong-chol said, adding that the US would fail if it tries to use the “close personal relations” between Trump and Kim Jong-un for delaying tactics.
He said that the US was getting on North Korea’s nerves by demanding its “final and fully verified denuclearization” while pushing other UN countries to strengthen sanctions and pressure on the North.
Washington has been attempting to “isolate and stifle” North Korea in a “more crafty and vicious way than before,” instead of heeding Kim Jong-un’s call to change its approach in nuclear negotiations, he said.
Those talks have faltered after the collapse of a February summit between Kim Jong-un and Trump in Hanoi, where the US rejected North Korean demands for broad sanctions relief in exchange for a piecemeal deal toward partially surrendering its nuclear capabilities.
The North expressed its displeasure with a flurry of short-range missile tests, while Kim Jong-un said he would “wait with patience until the end of the year for the United States to come up with a courageous decision.”
Washington and Pyongyang resumed working-level discussion in Sweden earlier this month, but the meeting broke down amid acrimony with the North Koreans calling the talks “sickening” and accusing the US officials of maintaining an “old stance and attitude.”
Following the breakdown of the Hanoi summit, South Korean officials have speculated that the North sidelined Kim Yong-chol, the top negotiator and former military intelligence chief, and let North Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs Ri Yong-ho and North Korean First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Choe Son-hui take the lead.
Kim Jong-un has signed vague statements calling for the “complete denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula in his meetings with Trump and South Korean President Moon Jae-in since last year.
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