US upbeat on nuclear talks despite North Korea’s disappointment

Published 1:30 am Saturday, October 5, 2019

By Steffen Trumpf and Gretel Johnston / dpa

STOCKHOLM — The United States positively portrayed nuclear disarmament talks held Saturday in Stockholm and said it accepted Sweden’s invitation to meet again in two weeks.

The U.S. State Department’s upbeat statement at the conclusion of the talks came after North Korea panned the negotiations and said they had broken down.

“The early comments from the (North Korean) delegation do not reflect the content or the spirit of today’s 8 1/2 hour discussion,” State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said in the statement.

“The U.S. brought creative ideas and had good discussions with its (North Korean) counterparts.”

The statement followed a comment by North Korean negotiator Kim Myong Gil to reporters that his side was “disappointed,” telling reporters the negotiations failed to meet Pyongyang’s expectations and therefore broke off, according to the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter.

He said the U.S. didn’t bring anything to the table and the next move would be up to Washington, according to the newspaper.

Ortagus said the U.S. delegation reviewed events since the Singapore summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un last year, and “discussed the importance of more intensive engagement to solve the many issues of concern for both sides.”

She said the U.S. also previewed a number of new initiatives that would allow progress in each of the four pillars in a joint statement agreed in Singapore.

“The United States and the (North Koreans) will not overcome a legacy of 70 years of war and hostility on the Korean Peninsula through the course of a single Saturday,” Ortagus said.

“These are weighty issues, and they require a strong commitment by both countries. The United States has that commitment.”

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said earlier Saturday he was he was hopeful about the talks.

“We came with a set of ideas. We hope that the North Koreans came with a good spirit and a willingness to try to move forward to implement what President Trump and Chairman Kim agreed to back in Singapore,” Pompeo said, speaking while on a visit to Greece, according to a transcript released by the State Department.

He described the U.S. negotiators as “a broad team with a full range of expertise to deal with the broad range of issues” related to the Singapore agreement.

The Stockholm talks are the first discussions in quite some time and a lot of work remains to be done, Pompeo said.

“We hope these initial meetings can set the course for a set of dialogues that can take place in the coming weeks and months that’ll really deliver on the commitments that were made in Singapore,” he said.

Swedish Foreign Minister Ann Linde wrote on Twitter earlier Saturday that it was encouraging to see that both delegations were currently in Sweden to hold talks at the working level.

“Dialogue needed to reach denuclearization and peaceful solution,” she tweeted.

Sweden plays an important role in the relationship between the two countries because, unlike the U.S., it maintains official diplomatic ties with Pyongyang.

Trump met Kim on the military demarcation line inside the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) separating North and South Korea at the end of June and agreed to resume working-level negotiations on Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program.

The informal meeting at the border came after their second summit, which took place in Vietnam in February, broke up early when the sides failed to make progress on the deal made in Singapore.

Trump is seeking North Korea’s denuclearization and has pressured the communist country by increasing economic sanctions.