SEOUL, South Korea: South Korea’s foreign minister quoted US officials as saying that it was North Korea that canceled a meeting this week between US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and a senior North Korean official on nuclear issues.
North Korea sent a notification to Washington to call off the meeting aimed at discussing the North’s denuclearization and setting up a second summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said Thursday.
Kang provided no reason on why North Korea canceled the meeting in New York. Kang told lawmakers she planned to discuss the matter with Pompeo over the phone. South Korea’s presidential office earlier said that the meeting’s postponement wouldn’t affect the momentum of talks between Washington and Pyongyang.
“We were notified by the United States that North Korea explained that (the meeting) should be postponed because both sides have busy schedules,” Kang said. “Secretary of State Pompeo has already said that the meeting will be rescheduled. I think it would be excessive to read too much into the postponement of the meeting.”
Trump told reporters at the White House that the United States is “in no rush” and that the meeting between Pompeo and his North Korean counterpart Kim Yong Chol would be rescheduled.
US State Department spokesman Robert Palladino said the postponement was “purely a scheduling issue” but refused to elaborate. He did not provide a straightforward answer when asked whether a discord over US-led sanctions against the North, which Pyongyang says must be removed before any progress in nuclear talks, has made it more difficult to set up meetings.
“Timing, timing,” Palladino said. “This has to do with timing as a matter — we’re talking about scheduling. And I’ll leave it at that.”
Seoul has worked hard to revive nuclear diplomacy between Washington and Pyongyang, which removed war fears among South Koreans following a provocative run in North Korean weapons tests and Trump’s threats of military action last year.
Kim shifted to diplomacy in 2018, meeting Trump in June between three summits with South Korean President Moon Jae-in. But the North has been playing hardball since the summits, fueling doubts about whether Kim would ever deal away a nuclear program he may see as his strongest guarantee of survival. North Korea’s Foreign Ministry last week criticized the United States for its continued support of sanctions and hinted it may resume nuclear development if the measures aren’t lifted.
Trump has been showing signs of slowing the pace of his diplomacy with North Korea, seemingly pivoting closer to his party’s mainstream on North Korea issues. Trump recently said he won’t play a “time game” with the North over a denuclearization deal.
Seoul: North Korea canceled meeting with Washington
Seoul: North Korea canceled meeting with Washington
SpaceX acquires xAI in record-setting deal as Musk looks to unify AI and space ambitions
- The deal is the biggest M&A transaction of all time
- Deal values xAI at $250 billion, SpaceX at $1 trillion
Elon Musk said on Monday that SpaceX has acquired his artificial-intelligence startup xAI in a record-setting deal that unifies Musk’s AI and space ambitions by combining the rocket-and-satellite company with the maker of the Grok chatbot. The deal, first reported by Reuters last week, represents one of the most ambitious tie-ups in the technology sector yet, combining a space-and-defense contractor with a fast-growing AI developer whose costs are largely driven by chips, data centers and energy. It could also bolster SpaceX’s data-center ambitions as Musk competes with rivals like Alphabet’s Google, Meta, Amazon-backed Anthropic and OpenAI in the AI sector.
The transaction values SpaceX at $1 trillion, and xAI at $250 billion, according to a person familiar with the matter.
“This marks not just the next chapter, but the next book in SpaceX and xAI’s mission: scaling to make a sentient sun to understand the Universe and extend the light of consciousness to the stars!” Musk said. The purchase of xAI sets a new record for the world’s largest M&A deal, a distinction held for more than 25 years when Vodafone bought Germany’s Mannesmann in a hostile takeover valued at $203 billion in 2000, according to data compiled by LSEG. The combined company of SpaceX and xAI is expected to price shares at about $527 each, another person familiar with the matter said. SpaceX was already the world’s most valuable privately held company, last valued at $800 billion in a recent insider share sale. XAI was last valued at $230 billion in November, according to the Wall Street Journal. The merger comes as the space company plans a blockbuster public offering this year that could value it at over $1.5 trillion, two people familiar with the matter said.
SpaceX, xAI and Musk did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The deal further consolidates Musk’s far-flung business empire and fortunes into a tighter, mutually reinforcing ecosystem – what some investors and analysts informally call the “Muskonomy” – which already includes Tesla, brain-chip maker Neuralink and tunnel firm the Boring Company. The world’s richest man has a history of merging his ventures together. Musk folded social media platform X into xAI through a share swap last year, giving the AI startup access to the platform’s data and distribution. In 2016, he used Tesla’s stock to buy his solar-energy company SolarCity.
The agreement could draw scrutiny from regulators and investors over governance, valuation and conflicts of interest given Musk’s overlapping leadership roles across multiple firms, as well as the potential movement of engineers, proprietary technology and contracts between entities.
SpaceX also holds billions of dollars in federal contracts with NASA, the Department of Defense and intelligence agencies, which all have some authority to review M&A transactions for national security and other risks.
