Seoul welcomes renewed prospect of US-N Korea talks

Seoul, May 26: South Korea on Saturday welcomed US President Donald Trump’s statement that his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was still possible. The US leader had earlier cancelled the June 12 meet with Kim, citing “hostility” displayed by Pyongyang towards Washington. However, on Friday Trump said that he might still meet Kim in Singapore, while leaving open the option of keeping it at a later date “if necessary”. “It’s a fortunate thing that the possibility of the North Korea-US dialogue is still alive without being terminated,” Seoul’s presidential spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom was quoted as saying by Efe news.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s government is “carefully watching the progress” of the conversation, he added, referring to the constant shifts in Trump’s stance on the summit. Trump’s stand softened after Pyongyang said it was willing to “sit face-to-face at any time, in any form”, in a statement by its First Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-Gwan. “Very good news to receive the warm and productive statement from North Korea. We will soon see where it will lead,” Trump tweeted after the North Korea statement came. The North and South Korean leaders met on April 28 in a historic summit to establish peace on the peninsula, first time since the Korean War in 1953. (IANS)