President Trump and Kim Jong Un abruptly ended summit talks earlier than scheduled today, unable to agree on the terms of a deal to determine the fate of North Korea’s nuclear weapons.
The public White House schedule has listed a ‘Joint Agreement Signing Ceremony’ with the chairman of the state affairs commission of DPRK, set for 2:05 pm local time.
But hours before that happened Trump pulled the plug.
“Sometimes you have to walk,” Trump said at a news conference after the talks fell apart.
He said the United States was unwilling to lift all of the sanctions imposed against the North without the promise of full denuclearization.
The stunning announcement came after Trump and Kim tamped down expectations for the two-day summit that played out amid ceremony in Vietnam and political turmoil in the United States.
“It wasn’t a good thing to be signing anything,” Trump said. “We had some options, and at this time we decided not to do any of the options.”
Trump said he had not committed to a third summit with Kim.
Trump claimed Kim offered to close down one weapons facility in exchange for the complete removal of sanctions, but that the U.S. team “brought many points up that they were surprised that we knew” and so demanded more actions from Kim’s regime.
The president confirmed that all the current sanctions on Pyongyang will remain in place.
“We’ll ultimately have a deal,” Trump told reporters just a few hours before cutting off talks early, but he added that “doesn’t mean we’re doing it in one day, in one meeting.”
Two years ago Trump blasted Kim and North Korea for the death of Otto Warmbier, an American student released after being held there for more than 15 months.
At the press conference today, Trump remarkably sided with Kim, using very familiar language: “You have a lot of people. And some really bad things happened to Otto. Some really, really bad things. But he tells me that he didn’t know about it, and I will take him at his word.”
Critics were quick to point out that this is yet another example of Trump backing a strongman or dictator and taking them at their word.