Ditching his derisive «Rocket Man» label for North Korea’s leader, U. S. President Donald Trump shifted his assessment of Kim Jong Un on Tuesday, calling th
Ditching his derisive “Rocket Man” label for North Korea’s leader, U. S. President Donald Trump shifted his assessment of Kim Jong Un on Tuesday, calling the dictator whose country is said to operate a system of gulags a “very honorable” man, as the American leader gears up for a meeting with Kim that he said would happen “very soon.”
Trump told reporters during a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron at the White House that North Korea had said it wanted to hold the summit “as soon as possible.”
Trump said the U. S. had been having “very good discussions with the North” toward the planned talks, which could come next month or in June.
“Kim Jong Un, he really has been very open and I think very honorable from everything we’re seeing,” Trump said. “Now, a lot of promises have been made by North Korea over the years, but they’ve never been in this position.”
The praise for the North Korean leader is a dramatic shift for the United States, which has long condemned the Kim family dynasty for its brutality and deception. Trump himself last year ripped into Kim as “Little Rocket Man” and said it is “hard to believe his people, and the military, put up with living in such horrible conditions.”
In its annual report on human rights across the globe, the U. S. State Department last week said “the people of North Korea faced egregious human rights violations by the government in nearly all reporting categories,” including “extrajudicial killings; disappearances; arbitrary arrests and detentions; torture; political prison camps in which conditions were often harsh, life-threatening, and included forced and compulsory labor.”
Trump has served up a markedly positive take on the North Korean issue in recent weeks, touting his odds of successfully resolving the seemingly intractable nuclear issue, but has also, at times, tried to temper expectations.
“Maybe it will be wonderful and maybe it won’t,” he said. “And if it’s not going to be fair and reasonable and good, I will — unlike past administrations, I will leave the table.
“But I think we have a chance of doing something very special with respect to North Korea.
