Donald Trump says he wants to meet North Korea’s Kim Jong Un again – as soon as ‘this year’
Donald Trump has said he wants to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un again.
Speaking at the White House as he held talks with the new South Korean president Lee Jae Myung, Mr Trump told reporters: “I’d like to meet him this year… I look forward to meeting with Kim Jong Un in the appropriate future.”
“I’d like to have a meeting. I got along great with him,” President Trump said, adding they “became very friendly” during his first term in office.
“We think we can do something in that regard,” he said, adding that he would like to help the relationship between the two Koreas.
Trump and Kim at the demilitarized zone in June 2019. Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump and Mr Kim held three meetings between 2018 and 2019 during Mr Trump’s first term and exchanged a number of, what the president called, “beautiful” letters.
In June 2019, Mr Trump briefly stepped into North Korea from the demilitarized zone (DMZ) with South Korea.
The US president on Monday responded to a question about whether he would return to the DMZ by fondly recalling the last time he did so.
“Remember when I walked across the line and everyone went crazy?” especially the Secret Service, Mr Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
But “I loved it”, Mr Trump said. He added he felt safe because he had a good relationship with Mr Kim.
Mr Trump met South Korea’s Lee Jae Myung at the Oval Office on Monday. Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump became the first sitting American president to set foot on North Korean soil six years ago.
However, little progress was made in curbing North Korea’s nuclear programme, and Mr Trump acknowledged in March this year that Pyongyang is a “nuclear power”.
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Since Mr Trump’s first-term meetings with Mr Kim ended, North Korea has shown no interest in returning to talks.
The White House said in June that Mr Trump would welcome communications with Mr Kim.
The attempts at rapprochement come after the election in South Korea of Mr Lee, who has pledged to reopen dialogue with North Korea.
As a gesture of engagement in June, Mr Lee suspended South Korean loudspeakers blasting music and messages into the North at the DMZ along their shared border.
Analysts say, however, that engaging North Korea will likely be more difficult for both Mr Lee and Mr Trump than it was in the president’s first term.
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Since then, North Korea has significantly expanded its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes.
And it has developed close ties with Russia through direct support for Moscow’s war in Ukraine, with Pyongyang providing both troops and weaponry.
Mr Kim told Russian President Vladimir Putin that his country will always stand with Moscow, state media reported in June.
Charlie Kirk has been posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Donald Trump.
The USA’s highest civilian honour was received by the conservative activist’s widow, Erika, at the White House.
Mr Kirk, 31, was fatally shot on 10 September while speaking at an event at Utah Valley University.
He founded Turning Point USA and toured American university campuses, debating students about current affairs.
Erika Kirk at the White House. Pic: Reuters
Erika Kirk and Donald Trump. Pic: Reuters
Addressing those attending the ceremony in the White House rose garden, the US president said they were there to “honour and remember a fearless warrior for liberty” and a “beloved leader who galvanised the next generation”.
He said Mr Kirk’s name was being entered “forever into the eternal roster of true American heroes”.
Mr Trump described Charlie Kirk as an “American patriot of the deepest conviction, the finest quality and the highest calibre”.
He said his nation had been “robbed” of an “extraordinary champion”.
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And Mr Trump said Mr Kirk was assassinated in the “prime of his life for boldly speaking the truth, for living his faith, and relentlessly fighting for a better and stronger America”.
The ceremony coincided with what would have been Mr Kirk’s 32nd birthday.
Mr Trump described Erika Kirk, now head of Turning Point USA, as someone who had “endured unspeakable hardship with unbelievable strength”.
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Charlie Kirk. File pic: AP
A 22-year-old man, Tyler Robinson, from the city of Washington in Utah has been charged with Mr Kirk’s murder. Prosecutors said they would seek the death penalty.
At a memorial event held at a stadium in Arizona, Erika Kirk told an enormous crowd she forgave her husband’s killer.
“The answer to hate is not hate,” she said.
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