{"id":17145,"date":"2018-10-03T00:23:07","date_gmt":"2018-10-03T00:23:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=17145"},"modified":"2018-10-03T00:23:07","modified_gmt":"2018-10-03T00:23:07","slug":"us-secretary-of-state-pompeo-to-meet-north-koreas-kim-jong-un","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=17145","title":{"rendered":"US Secretary of State Pompeo to meet North Korea&#8217;s Kim Jong-un"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"body-200771816342556199\" readability=\"115.00555115\">\n<p class=\"speakable\">US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will meet <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/topics\/country\/north-korea.html\">North Korean<\/a> leader Kim Jong-un on Sunday for a new round of talks on denuclearisation, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/topics\/country\/united-states.html\">US<\/a> State Department said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"speakable\">Pompeo, who is trying to arrange a new summit between Kim and US President Donald Trump, will also head to US allies Japan and South Korea, as well as North Korea&#8217;s chief ally China, spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"speakable\">It will be Pompeo&#8217;s fourth visit to North Korea amid American hopes of reaching an agreement to end its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.<\/p>\n<p>Pyongyang is hopeful of securing relief from punitive economic sanctions in any deal.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think it shows momentum that he is paying his fourth trip,&#8221; Nauert told reporters.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Everybody recognizes that there is a ways to go,&#8221; she said, but added: &#8220;We feel confident enough to hop on a plane to continue these negotiations.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The invitation to return to Pyongyang to discuss North Korean denuclearisation efforts was made during a meeting with North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho on the sidelines of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2018\/09\/trumps-general-assembly-speech-displays-altered-korea-stance-180925084824920.html\">United Nations General Assembly<\/a> last week.<\/p>\n<p>Pompeo will open his trip on Saturday in Tokyo, where he will meet Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who has long championed a hard line on North Korea but recently said he was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2018\/09\/japan-abe-open-meeting-north-korean-leader-kim-jong-180926100540855.html\">willing to meet Kim<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>After the trip to Pyongyang, Pompeo will head to Seoul, where he will meet President Moon Jae-in, who has helped spearhead the reconciliation efforts with North Korea.<\/p>\n<p>Nauert said Pompeo would head afterwards to Beijing for meetings with unspecified officials.<\/p>\n<p>Kim and Trump met in June in Singapore in the first-ever summit between the two countries that have never signed a peace treaty to formally end their 1950-53 war.<\/p>\n<p>On Saturday, Trump lavished praise on Kim and said they had fallen &#8220;in love&#8221; after exchanging letters.<\/p>\n<p>Human rights groups consider Kim to be one of the world&#8217;s most repressive leaders.<\/p>\n<p>Trump paints rapprochement with North Korea as a signature foreign policy achievement, although critics question whether Pyongyang has taken any firm action.<\/p>\n<p>The US has insisted on maintaining tight UN sanctions against North Korea during the diplomatic drive, while Beijing has said it is time to start easing sanctions.<\/p>\n<p>Kim has committed to give up his country&#8217;s nuclear weapons although his actions have fallen short of Washington&#8217;s demands for a complete inventory of North Korea&#8217;s weapons programs and irreversible steps to give up a nuclear arsenal that potentially threatens the US.<\/p>\n<div data-embed-type=\"Brightcove\" data-embed-id=\"5831630200001\">\n<table class=\"in-article-item video Fullwidth\" border=\"0\">\n<tbody readability=\"1\">\n<tr>\n<td>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr readability=\"3\">\n<td readability=\"5\">\n<p>Is North Korea&#8217;s timeline denuclearise for real?<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Sunday for a new round of talks on denuclearisation, the US State Department said. Pompeo, who is trying to arrange a new summit between Kim and US President Donald Trump, will also head to US allies Japan and South Korea, as&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":17146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}