- January 20, 2019
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Trump has planned to meet North Korean Leader: White House
The White House informed reporters after a visit of Pyongyang’s top officials in Washington. The U.S President Donald Trump and North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un are reaching to the date for a second summit. On Friday, Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with the vice chairman for the central committee of the ruling Korean Workers’ Party Kim Yong Chol. The meeting took place to move forward discussions on a historic peace-for-denuclearization process between the United States and North Korea. The two longtime rivals are seeking a sequel to their first-ever summit held in Singapore last June and, though the venue was yet to be determined, had reportedly settled on holding the dialogue sometime late next month.
The White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a statement, “President Donald J. Trump met with Kim Yong Chol for an hour and a half, to discuss denuclearization and a second summit, which will take place near the end of February. The President looks forward to meeting with Chairman Kim at a place to be announced at a later date”. Since the 1950s Korean War that pit North Korea and its communist allies China and the then Soviet Union against South Korea and U.S.-led United Nations allies, Washington and Pyongyang have been foes. The feud escalated in the 21st century with the ruling Kim dynasty’s development of nuclear weapons. After a spike in tensions in 2017, Kim Jong Un reached out for peace talks early last year with South Korea and the U.S., beginning a process that has gradually eased frictions on the Korean Peninsula.
Kim Yong Chol was believed to have carried with him a letter from Kim Jong Un to Trump. The two world leaders have corresponded on several occasions in letters described by the president as “beautiful.” Trump reportedly delivered a new letter to Kim just a couple a days ago. The relationship between the U.S. and North Korea has improved significantly over the past year. Travel for U.S. citizens officially remains banned since the death of U.S student Otto Warmbier. He was died shortly after being released from a North Korean prison after being returned to the U.S in a comatose state in the month of July 2017.