North Korea accuses US secretary of state of making ‘gangster-like’ demands. A senator sees ‘China’s hands all over this.’
After being accused of “gangster-like diplomacy” by North Korea, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo brushed off the charges on Sunday, saying he would continue to pursue denuclearisation talks with North Korea.
After meeting his Japanese and South Korean counterparts in Tokyo, Pompeo said he was confident North Korean leader Kim Jong-un would stick to a commitment made during a summit with US President Donald Trump in Singapore last month to destroy his nuclear weapons.
“When we spoke to them about denuclearisation, they did not push back,” Pompeo told a news conference after two days of talks in Pyongyang that ended on Saturday.
“The road ahead will be difficult and challenging and we know that critics will try to minimise the work that we’ve achieved.”
Leading US senators expressed concern about North Korea’s harsh words and urged the Trump administration to keep up the pressure on Pyongyang.
Republican Senator Joni Ernst, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said joint military exercises with South Korea that were suspended to show goodwill towards North Korea should be resumed “soon” if denuclearisation talks sputter.
Pompeo said that while he saw progress in Pyongyang, the United States was not relaxing the current sanctions or changing its “ironclad” commitment to the defence of allies South Korea and Japan.
Pompeo spoke after North Korea said the talks “brought us in a dangerous situation where we may be shaken in our unshakeable will for denuclearisation, rather than consolidating trust.”
The statement was carried by the official KCNA news agency on Saturday soon after Pompeo left Pyongyang, raising questions about the future of the talks in which he is trying to persuade Pyongyang to give up a nuclear weapons programme that threatens the United States.
Kim made a broad commitment in Singapore to “work toward denuclearisation” but did not give details on how or when he would dismantle North Korea’s nuclear programme.
