The U.S. State Department said for the first time that it has a deadline for North Korea to denuclearize: January 2021, according to comments by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
The deadline was announced as South Korean President Moon Jae-in and his North Korean counterpart, Kim Jong Un, wrapped up a three-day summit in Pyongyang.
“I talk to my counterparts [in North Korea] with some frequency,” Pompeo told Fox News host Laura Ingraham. “It doesn’t get reported. I’m glad about that; I’m glad we’re able to keep that quiet. And so, we’re making the progress that we need.”
Pompeo said the United States is ready to engage after North Korean leader Kim reaffirmed his commitment to denuclearization, which he had promised President Donald Trump at their historic June meeting in Singapore.
At that summit, Trump said that Kim threw out the timetable of one year for the denuclearization process, although that timetable was never set as a demand from the White House. The United States worked with other nations to impose sanctions on North Korea and has said that it will continue to impose sanctions until North Korea has shown that it has dismantled its nuclear facilities.
What those “steps” are is unclear.
Publicly, Moon has said that the United States must end its “hostile stance” toward North Korea before it would dismantle its nuclear weapon facilities.
In the past, Kim has asked for an official end to the Korean War. In 1953, the two sides agreed to an armistice but not a peace treaty.
Russia and China
Russia and China have taken heat from Washington for meddling in sanctions that both countries agreed to as members of the U.N. Security Council.Trump said in August, he was postponing Pompeo’s trip to North Korea until after the China–U.S. trade relationship was on better ground. “Because of our much tougher trading stance with China, I do not believe they are helping with the process of denuclearization as they once were (despite the UN Sanctions, which are in place),” Trump said in an Aug. 24 tweet.
Russia has also aroused the ire of the United States for allegedly tampering with a report on ship-to-ship oil transfers to North Korea not allowed under UN sanctions.
U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley said that a report on compliance with the sanctions was edited by Russia before it was submitted to a committee, and that the information that was omitted was all transgressions by Russia.