Virtually everyone in the US faults North Korea for threatening to cancel the Trump-Kim summit scheduled for June 12 in Singapore. No one, including the liberal media, bothers to address North Korea’s conditions for a successful summit or the reasons for its warning about a cancellation. Let’s review the matter with some objectivity.
PYONGYANG, DPRK (Analysis) — If there is any country on the list of U.S. adversaries about which almost everyone lacks critical understanding, it is the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK or North Korea). Unlike most countries, the DPRK has managed to stay fairly closed to U.S. interference and intelligence-gathering — whether by embassies and consulates, or other channels of soft-power such as NGOs (although some have gotten through).
Singapore has been chosen to host the unlikely summit between U.S. president Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in early June.
WASHINGTON — As the U.S. summit with North Korea fast approaches, both countries are jostling to preserve their respective interests. The tense signals, subtle shifts in position, and U.S. provocations make clear that the summit won’t be short on tough negotiations.
Despite the honeyed words of previous months following U.S. President Donald Trump’s agreement to meet directly with Kim Jong-un, Washington is adopting a more hard-line stance demanding “permanent” denuclearization and a range of agenda items that likely haven’t previously been discussed with Pyongyang.
The key to understanding Kim Jong-un’s summit offer to Donald Trump is that it is the product of negotiations which have been underway since October.
At that time a senior North Korean diplomat visited Moscow, and reports of the talks which took place made it clear that the Russians were pressing for the opening of bilateral negotiations between the North Koreans and the South Koreans to end the crisis.
It is looking unlikely that US President Trump and Russian President Putin will hold a summit until the two meet at the coming G20 summit in July.
That seems to be the right take from comments made earlier by Dmitry Peskov, Russian President Putin’s spokesman.
This is what RT reports Peskov having said
The Russians are playing down speculation of an early summit meeting between Russian President Putin and US President Trump.
President Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov is reported to have told the BBC that a meeting is months away, and that preparations for it have not even begun. Supposedly, they cannot begin until after Putin has telephoned Trump to congratulate him on becoming US President.
This is what RT reports Peskov as having said in part
As both President elect Trump’s and Russian President Putin’s press spokesmen both deny a claim published by the London Times of a planned Putin-Trump summit in the Icelandic capital Reykjavik – Trump’s spokesman called it “100% false” – the London Times incredibly still continues to lead with the story, which it sources to the usual anonymous officials.
