WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he had received a “great” letter from North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and would probably meet him again in the not-too-distant future as part of efforts to persuade him to give up his nuclear weapons.
Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump defended stuttering US negotiations with Kim, saying that if it had not been for his administration “you’d be having a nice big fat war in Asia.” He reiterated that there was no hurry.
“I’m not in any rush. I don’t have to rush. All I know is there’s no rockets, there’s no testing,” he said, referring to North Korea’s nuclear and missile tests that have been halted since the second half of 2017.
Trump said he had watched coverage of Kim’s New Year speech on the US Public Broadcasting Service.
“They said that in Chairman Kim’s speech he really wants to get together, he wants to denuclearize and a lot of good things are happening,” Trump said.
“They really do want to do something. Now, does that mean it’s going to be done? Who knows? A deal’s a deal, you never know, but I tell you, we’ve established a very good relationship with North Korea.”
“We’ll probably now have another meeting. He’d like to meet, I’d like to meet,” Trump said. “We’ll set that up, we’ll be setting that up in the not-too-distant future.”
Kim vowed to work toward denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula when he met Trump for the first time at a summit in Singapore in June, but there has been little concrete progress since.
Kim said in a nationally televised New Year address on Tuesday that he was ready to meet again with Trump anytime, but warned he may take a “new path” if US sanctions and pressure continued.
Trump, who in 2017 threatened to rain “fire and fury like the world has never seen” on North Korea because of the threat its nuclear weapons and missiles posed to the United States, said a world war had been averted.
“That was going to be a war — there could have been a World War Three to be honest with you ... And instead, we have somebody who I really think wants to get on to economic development and making a lot of success and money, frankly, for his country.”
Trump said North Korea had “tremendous” potential, and added: “We’ll help them out too.”
On Monday, South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that Kim had sent a message to Trump regarding the stalled nuclear talks. The report did not include details about the “letter-like” communication.
Trump told reporters on Wednesday the letter was “great” and that he would love to read it out loud, but did not do so.
Trump has said previously that a second summit with Kim was likely in January or February, though he wrote on Twitter last month he was “in no hurry.”
’Sinister intention’
In his address on Tuesday, Kim said denuclearization was his “firm will” and North Korea had “declared at home and abroad that we would neither make and test nuclear weapons any longer nor use and proliferate them.”
However, he warned that North Korea might be “compelled to explore a new path” to defend its sovereignty if the United States “seeks to force something upon us unilaterally ... and remains unchanged in its sanctions and pressure.”
In spite of Trump’s words, Kim’s comments have fueled doubts over whether North Korea intends to give up a nuclear weapons program it has long considered essential to its security.
Analysts said Kim’s message sent clear signals that North Korea, which has sought acceptance as a “responsible” nuclear power, was willing to stay in talks with Washington and Seoul this year — but on its own terms.
North Korea’s main state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper said in a commentary on Thursday last year saw “wonderful changes” and “great movements” in North Korea’s relations with the South Korea and the United States, but progress in inter-Korean relations were “locked up in stagnation” because of USpolicies.
“The US still remains unchanged in the policy hostile toward the DPRK,” the paper wrote, using the initials of North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
The paper accused the United States of having a “a sinister intention to deprive the DPRK of its nuclear weapons and bring it to its knees without goodwill to build a new, good relationship with the DPRK.”
“The US is urged to do what it should do for the improvement of the DPRK-US relations, not making useless admonition while meddling in the issue of north-south relations, an internal issue of the Korean nation,” it said.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made several trips to Pyongyang last year but the two sides have yet to reschedule an abruptly canceled November meeting between him and senior North Korean official Kim Yong Chol aimed at paving the way for a second summit.
As well as demanding a lifting of sanctions, Pyongyang has been seeking an official end to the 1950-1953 Korean War in response to its initial, unilateral steps that have included dismantling its only known nuclear testing site and a missile engine facility.
US officials have said the extent of initial North Korean steps was not confirmed and could be easily reversed. Washington has halted some large-scale military exercises with South Korea to aid negotiations, but has called for strict global sanctions enforcement until North Korea’s full, verifiable denuclearization.
Trump expects second Kim meeting in ‘not-too-distant future’
Trump expects second Kim meeting in ‘not-too-distant future’
- Trump said he had watched coverage of Kim’s New Year speech on the US Public Broadcasting Service
- Kim vowed to work toward denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula when he met Trump for the first time at a summit in Singapore in June
Tens of thousands protest in Minneapolis over fatal ICE shooting
- Federal-state tensions escalated further on Thursday when a US Border Patrol agent in Portland, Oregon, shot and wounded a man and woman in their car after an attempted vehicle stop
MINNEAPOLIS: Tens of thousands of people marched through Minneapolis on Saturday to decry the fatal shooting of a woman by a US immigration agent, part of more than 1,000 rallies planned nationwide this weekend against the federal government’s deportation drive. The massive turnout in Minneapolis despite a whipping, cold wind underscores how the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer on Wednesday has struck a chord, fueling protests in major cities and some towns. Minnesota’s Democratic leaders and the administration of President Donald Trump, a Republican, have offered starkly different accounts of the incident.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Minneapolis police estimate tens of thousands present at protests on Saturday
• Mayor urges protesters to remain peaceful and not ‘take the bait’ from Trump
• Over 1,000 ‘ICE Out’ rallies planned across US
• Minnesota Democrats denied access to ICE facility outside Minneapolis
Led by a team of Indigenous Mexican dancers, demonstrators in Minneapolis, which has a metropolitan population of 3.8 million, marched toward the residential street where Good was shot in her car.
’HEARTBROKEN AND DEVASTATED’
The boisterous crowd, which the Minneapolis Police Department estimated in the tens of thousands, chanted Good’s name and slogans such as “Abolish ICE” and “No justice, no peace — get ICE off our streets.”
“I’m insanely angry, completely heartbroken and devastated, and then just like longing and hoping that things get better,” Ellison Montgomery, a 30-year-old protester, told Reuters.
Minnesota officials have called the shooting unjustified, pointing to bystander video they say showed Good’s vehicle turning away from the agent as he fired. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, has maintained that the agent acted in self-defense because Good, a volunteer in a community network that monitors and records ICE operations in Minneapolis, drove forward in the direction of the agent who then shot her, after another agent had approached the driver’s side and told her to get out of the car.
The shooting on Wednesday came soon after some 2,000 federal officers were dispatched to the Minneapolis-St. Paul area in what DHS has called its largest operation ever, deepening a rift between the administration and Democratic leaders in the state. Federal-state tensions escalated further on Thursday when a US Border Patrol agent in Portland, Oregon, shot and wounded a man and woman in their car after an attempted vehicle stop. Using language similar to its description of the Minneapolis incident, DHS said the driver had tried to “weaponize” his vehicle and run over agents.
The two DHS-related shootings prompted a coalition of progressive and civil rights groups, including Indivisible and the American Civil Liberties Union, to plan more than 1,000 events under the banner “ICE Out For Good” on Saturday and Sunday. The rallies have been scheduled to end before nightfall to minimize the potential for violence.
In Philadelphia, protesters chanted “ICE has got to go” and “No fascist USA,” as they marched from City Hall to a rally outside a federal detention facility, according to the local ABC affiliate. In Manhattan, several hundred people carried anti-ICE signs as they walked past an immigration court where agents have arrested migrants following their hearings.
“We demand justice for Renee, ICE out of our communities, and action from our elected leaders. Enough is enough,” said Leah Greenberg, co-executive director of Indivisible.
DEMONSTRATIONS MOSTLY PEACEFUL
Minnesota became a major flashpoint in the administration’s efforts to deport millions of immigrants months before the Good shooting, with Trump criticizing its Democratic leaders amid a massive welfare fraud scandal involving some members of the large Somali-American community there.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat who has been critical of immigration agents and the shooting, told a press conference earlier on Saturday that the demonstrations have remained mostly peaceful and that anyone damaging property or engaging in unlawful activity would be arrested by police.
“We will not counter Donald Trump’s chaos with our own brand of chaos,” Frey said. “He wants us to take the bait.”
More than 200 law enforcement officers were deployed Friday night to control protests that led to $6,000 in damage at the Depot Renaissance Hotel and failed attempts by some demonstrators to enter the Hilton Canopy Hotel, believed to house ICE agents, the City of Minneapolis said in a statement.
Police Chief Brian O’Hara said some in the crowd scrawled graffiti and damaged windows at the Depot Renaissance Hotel. He said the gathering at the Hilton Canopy Hotel began as a “noise protest” but escalated as more than 1,000 demonstrators converged on the site, leading to 29 arrests.
“We initiated a plan and took our time to de-escalate the situation, issued multiple warnings, declaring an unlawful assembly, and ultimately then began to move in and disperse the crowd,” O’Hara said.
HOUSE REPRESENTATIVES TURNED AWAY FROM ICE FACILITY
Three Minnesota congressional Democrats showed up at a regional ICE headquarters near Minneapolis on Saturday morning, where protesters have clashed with federal agents this week, but were denied access. Legislators called the denial illegal.
“We made it clear to ICE and DHS that they were violating federal law,” US Representative Angie Craig told reporters as she stood outside the Whipple Federal Building in St. Paul with Representatives Kelly Morrison and Ilhan Omar.
Federal law prohibits DHS from blocking members of Congress from entering ICE detention sites, but DHS has increasingly restricted such oversight visits, prompting confrontations with Democratic lawmakers.
“It is our job as members of Congress to make sure those detained are treated with humanity, because we are the damn United States of America,” Craig said.
Referencing the damage and protests at Minneapolis hotels overnight, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said the congressional Democrats were denied entry to ensure “the safety of detainees and staff, and in compliance with the agency’s mandate.” She said DHS policies require members of Congress to notify ICE at least seven days in advance of facility visits.
