North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has suggested that he is open to talks with the US if Washington stops insisting that his country give up its nuclear weapons,
Al Jazeera reports.
“If the United States drops the absurd obsession with denuclearising us and accepts reality, and wants genuine peaceful coexistence, there is no reason for us not to sit down with the United States,” Kim said in a speech at the Supreme People’s Assembly in Pyongyang on Sunday, according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
The North Korean leader also commented on US President Donald Trump, whom he met three times during Trump’s first presidency, saying: “Personally, I still have fond memories of US President Trump.”
Kim’s comments come after both Trump and South Korean leader Lee Jae-myung expressed their willingness to meet with their North Korean counterpart at a meeting at the White House last month.
“Someday, I’ll see him. I look forward to seeing him. He was very good with me,” Trump said at the time, adding that he knew Kim, whose family has ruled North Korea for three generations, “better than anybody, almost, other than his sister”.
Lee, who has been vocally supportive of thawing relations with his country’s northern neighbour since taking office in June, said at the same meeting that he hoped the US president would “build a Trump Tower” in North Korea “so that I can play golf there”.
Despite overtures from Lee and Trump, North Korea has been critical of joint military drills between the US and South Korea, with Kim Jong Un’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, describing them as a “reckless” invasion rehearsal.
