Things 'going very well,' Trump says after talk with ROK's Moon

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U‍S President Donald Trump said details of his potential summit with Democratic People's Republic of Korea's (DPRK) Kim Jong Un are being ironed out, and that he’d spoken with the leaders of the Republic of Korea (ROK) and Japan about preparations for the historic meeting.

"Things are going very well, time and location of meeting with North Korea (DPRK) is being set,” the president said on Twitter. The call early on Saturday (April 28) with ROK President Moon Jae-in was "a long and very good talk", Trump said.

Twitter screenshot. /VCG Photo

Meanwhile, Trump said on Saturday a meeting with the DPRK could happen in the coming weeks.

"I think we will have a meeting over the next three or four weeks,” Trump said at a campaign rally in Washington, Michigan. “It’s going to be a very important meeting, the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula."

On Friday, Trump said that the potential location of a meeting with the DPRK's leader had been narrowed down to two or three locations that he didn’t specify, adding “hopefully we’re going to have great success.”

"I don’t think he’s playing," Trump said Friday of Kim, who earlier held a historic meeting with the ROK’s Moon.

The two agreed to work toward formally ending their decades-long war and pursue the “complete denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula.

"We will, I think, come up with a solution and, if we don’t, we leave the room with great respect and we just keep it going," said Trump, speaking to reporters at the beginning of a meeting in the Oval Office with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

US President Donald Trump speaks as Angela Merkel, Germany's chancellor, listens during a meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, April 27, 2018. /VCG Photo

Later, at a joint news conference with Merkel, the US president added that he and Kim “have a very good working relationship” and “a lot of good things are happening.”

Trump has said he hopes to meet with Kim by early June to try to resolve a standoff between Washington and Pyongyang over the DPRK’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.

He had previously said the two countries were looking at five locations for the summit, which would be the first meeting between a DPRK leader and a sitting US president.

Mongolia and Singapore are the final two sites under consideration for the summit, CBS News reported, though Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said on Saturday that there had been no formal request for his city-state to host the meeting.

"A lot of very positive things happened over the last 24 hours,” Trump said. "We'll be setting up a meeting very shortly. We have it broken down to probably two sites now, two or three sites, locations. And hopefully we’re going to have great success."

South Korean President Moon Jae-in (L) and US President Donald Trump arrive to give a joint press conference in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, DC on June 30, 2017. /VCG Photo

Trump hailed Friday’s Moon-Kim meeting, declaring “KOREAN WAR TO END!” on Twitter.

'Bad manners'

It remains to be seen whether the DPRK will meet Trump’s demand to give up its nuclear weapons and missiles.

One ominous sign was commentary from the DPRK's state-run media following the Korean leaders’ meeting calling on the US to drop its “anachronistic hostile policy” and “bad manners.”

It declared the DPRK a “world-level politico-ideological and military power” and said it would contribute to building “a world without nuclear weapons.”

Still, new US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who met with Kim over the Easter weekend, said he has “a sense” that the DPRK leader is serious about denuclearization. Speaking to reporters in Brussels on Friday, less than 24 hours after being sworn in, Pompeo echoed some of Trump’s favorite phrases, saying an agreement with Kim would be a “wonderful thing.”

US President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hold a news conference at Mar-a-Lago resort on April 18, 2018 in West Palm Beach, Florida. /VCG Photo

Trump said on Saturday that he had spoken with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe “to inform him of the ongoing negotiations.”

On Friday, Trump tweeted his thanks to Chinese President Xi Jinping on the DPRK. “Without him it would have been a much longer, tougher, process!”

Source(s): AFP