President Donald Trump is open to conversations with the Noord -Korean leader Kim Jong Un “without any conditions,” said an official of the White House, while the Minister of Unification of South Korea warned that Pyongyang’s rockets could reach the American mainland.
Minister of South Korean unification Chung Dong-Young used blunt language in Berlin this week and told reporters: “North Korea has become one of three countries that are able to attack the American mainland,” ald Yonhap News Agency. “What needs to be recognized must be rationally recognized.”
Nuclear threats from Noord -Korea looms quietly behind wars in Gaza and Ukraine near UNGA
President Donald Trump and leader of Noord -Korea, Kim Jong Un on the military demarcation line that distributes North and South Korea, in the Joint Security Area (JSA) of Panmunjom in the Demilitarisisized Zone (DMZ), 30 June 2019. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty images)
Yonhap also reported that Chung said that the “strategic position of Pyongyang is different” than in 2018, when Trump and Kim held their first top in Singapore.
“Recognizing this reality should be the starting point” when dealing with the regime, Chung told reporters.
But experts say that North Korea has long had the opportunity to reach the American mainland with intercontinental ballistic missiles.
“They have long tested ICBMS,” says Bob Peters, senior researcher for strategic deterrence at the Heritage Foundation.
“The question is for a long time, they have a core head that can go under a nasal cone on an ICBM that by definition, exo atmospheric, comes down and then hits a target with some appearance of accuracy and then exploding and then a nuclear yield,” Peters added. “That is the real question – do they have that ability? That is not what it sounded like the South Korean minister said.”
Trump praises Kim Jong un -relationship in the middle of South Korea -Top
Trump met Kim three times during his first administration. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty images)
In the meantime, Kim has said that the dialogue with the US is possible, but on its conditions.
“If the United States drops the absurd obsession with the denuclearization of us and accepts reality, and wants to really want peaceful coexistence, there is no reason for us not to sit with the United States,” Staatsmedia quoted Kim as saying.
A meeting with Kim would make Trump’s fourth sit-down with the dictator, at a time when his country has again become increasingly hostile to American interests.
In July the White House said that Trump “remains open to the involvement of leader Kim to reach a fully colored North Korea.” But Noord -Korea claimed that it would not meet the American president if he demanded denuclearization.
On Monday, the North Korean Vice -Minister of Foreign Affairs told Kim Son Gyong to the General Assembly of the United Nations that his country will never give up his nuclear program, Reuters reported.
Trump is planned to travel to Asia later this month for a top of an economic leaders with South Korean President Lee Jae-Myung. A high American officer said there is no demilitarized zone meeting with Kim on the agenda.
The conversations between Trump and Kim silent threats between the two nations, but did not lead to a denuclearly North Korea. (API/Gamma-Rapho via Getty images)
Reports have suggested that Trump can meet Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit, October 30-Nov. 1, although plans are still being completed.
In a phone call last month, XI Trump and First Lady Melania Trump invited to visit China. Trump returned the invitation.
The same official said that the progress in the field of nuclear conversations depends on China.
“The first thing that should happen is that the Chinese acknowledge and be more transparent about his own programs,” said the civil servant.
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The estimates of the US set the nuclear arsenal of China at around 600 core heads in 2024, with projections of 1,000 in 2030. Noord -Korea is supposed to possess around 50 core heads, with sufficiently split material for a maximum of 90.
Last year, Pyongyang declared an “irreversible hegemonic position” after test-firing of his Hwasong-19 intercontinental ballistic rocket, of which North Korea has claimed that it can touch the American mainland.
Trump strengthens deterrence, even if he keeps the option of “conversations without conditions” open.
