TOKYO: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe met with South Korea’s intelligence chief on Tuesday and said that while he welcomes any dialogue with North Korea regarding the country’s denuclearization, the North must take action as well.
“I believe it is extremely important that North Korea takes concrete actions to achieve what it has said,” Abe said at the beginning of talks with South Korean intelligence chief Suh Hoon.
President Donald Trump has agreed to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un by May, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in is set to meet Kim in late April.
Suh is in Tokyo to brief Japanese officials on developments. He was part of a South Korean delegation that met Kim in Pyongyang last week. Another senior member of the delegation has briefed Chinese officials in Beijing.
“I think it was very meaningful that Workers Party of Korea Chairman Kim Jong Un expressed his intentions toward denuclearization in his own words,” Suh said. He said he hoped to convey Moon’s message that cooperation between the two countries is crucial to push forward a move toward peace on the Korean Peninsula.
On Monday, Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono, after meeting with Suh, credited recent changes in North Korea’s position to increased pressure by the international community, and said the pressure must continue until the North fulfills its promises with concrete actions.
In Beijing on Monday, South Korea’s national security director, Chung Eui-yong, met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and praised his role in contributing to the recent positive changes on the Korean Peninsula. Xi told Chung the peninsula was “facing an important opportunity of mitigation and dialogue,” according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
North Korea’s foreign trade, more than 90 percent of which passes through China, has taken a hit since Beijing agreed to increasingly harsh UN Security Council resolutions aimed at pressuring the North into ceasing its nuclear and missile tests and rejoining denuclearization talks.
Japan’s Abe: North Korea must take real steps to denuclearization
Japan’s Abe: North Korea must take real steps to denuclearization
‘Keep dreaming’: NATO chief says Europe can’t defend itself without US
BRUSSELS: NATO chief Mark Rutte warned Monday Europe cannot defend itself without the United States, in the face of calls for the continent to stand on its own feet after tensions over Greenland.
US President Donald Trump roiled the transatlantic alliance by threatening to seize the autonomous Danish territory — before backing off after talks with Rutte last week.
The diplomatic crisis sparked gave fresh momentum to those advocating for Europe to take a tougher line against Trump and break its military reliance on Washington.
“If anyone thinks here again, that the European Union, or Europe as a whole, can defend itself without the US — keep on dreaming. You can’t,” Rutte told lawmakers at the European Parliament.
He said that EU countries would have to double defense spending from the five percent NATO target agreed last year to 10 percent and spend “billions and billions” on building nuclear arms.
“You would lose the ultimate guarantor of our freedom, which is the US nuclear umbrella,” Rutte said. “So hey, good luck.”
The former Dutch prime minister insisted that US commitment to NATO’s Article Five mutual defense clause remained “total,” but that the United States expected European countries to keep spending more on their militaries.
“They need a secure Euro-Atlantic, and they also need a secure Europe. So the US has every interest in NATO,” he said.
The NATO head reiterated his repeated praise for Trump for pressuring reluctant European allies to step up defense spending.
He also appeared to knock back a suggestion floated by the EU’s defense commissioner Andrius Kubilius earlier this month for a possible European defense force that could replace US troops on the continent.
“It will make things more complicated. I think Putin will love it. So think again,” Rutte said.
On Greenland, Rutte said he had agreed with Trump that NATO would “take more responsibility for the defense of the Arctic,” but it was up to Greenlandic and Danish authorities to negotiate over US presence on the island.
“I have no mandate to negotiate on behalf of Denmark, so I didn’t, and I will not,” he said.
Rutte reiterated that he had stressed to Trump the cost paid by NATO allies in Afghanistan after the US leader caused outrage by playing down their contribution.
“For every two American soldiers who paid the ultimate price, one soldier of an ally or a partner, a NATO ally or a partner country, did not return home,” he said.
“I know that America greatly appreciates all the efforts.”
