President
Trump and Kim Jong Un failed to reach an agreement on
denuclearization. (AP)
President
Trump abruptly walked away from negotiations with North Korea in Vietnam and headed back to Washington
on Thursday afternoon, saying the U.S. is unwilling to meet Kim Jong Un's demand
of lifting all sanctions on the rogue regime without first securing its
meaningful commitment to denuclearization.
Trump, speaking in Hanoi, Vietnam, told reporters he
had asked Kim to do
more regarding his intentions to denuclearize, and “he was unprepared to do
that.”
“Sometimes you have to walk,” Trump said at a solo press
conference following the summit.
Trump specifically said negotiations fell through
after the North demanded a full removal of U.S.-led international sanctions in
exchange for the shuttering of the North's Yongbyon nuclear facility. Trump and
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters that the United States wasn't
willing to make a deal without the North committing to giving up its secretive
nuclear facilities outside Yongbyon, as well as its missile and warheads
program.
“It was about the sanctions,” Trump said. “Basically,
they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, and we couldn’t do that.
They were willing to denuke a large portion of the areas that we wanted, but we
couldn’t give up all of the sanctions for that.”
"I'd much rather do it right than do it fast,"
Trump added, echoing his remarks from earlier in the day, when he insisted that
"speed" was not important. "We're in position to do something
very special."
Both leaders motorcades roared away from the downtown
Hanoi summit site within minutes of each other after both a lunch and
the signing ceremony were scuttled. Trump's closing news conference was moved
up, and he departed for Washington on Air Force One several hours ahead of
schedule.
"Sometimes you have to walk."
— President Trump on his dealings with North Korea
The president said he trusted Kim's promise that he
would not resume nuclear and missile testing, but that the current U.S.
sanctions would stay in place.
“No agreement was reached at this time, but their
respective teams look forward to meeting in the future,” White House press
secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement prior to Trump's press conference.
Regardless, Sanders described the meetings between Trump
and Kim as “very good and constructive.”
As for a potential third summit, Trump remained
noncommittal.
Kim had signaled during an earlier, unprecedented
question-and-answer session with reporters that he is "ready to
denuclearize," reaffirming a commitment long sought by the Trump
administration and the international community.
“If I’m not willing to do that, I won’t be here right
now,” Kim said through an interpreter.
"That's a good answer," Trump replied.
President
Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un take a walk after their first
meeting at the Sofitel Legend Metropole Hanoi hotel. (AP)
Trump and Kim signed a document during last year's summit in
Singapore agreeing to work toward the "complete denuclearization of the
Korean Peninsula," but tensions have since flared between the two nations,
and North Korea later said it would not remove its nuclear weapons unless
the U.S. first reduced its own nuclear threat.
A working lunch was supposed to get underway between the
two leaders in Vietnam on Thursday afternoon, after a whirlwind day on Capitol
Hill that threatened to steal the spotlight from the second major summit
between the two leaders. But neither Trump nor Kim showed up.
Earlier, history appeared to have been made when Kim
answered questions from a foreign journalist -- almost certainly for the first
time ever.
President
Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un
Thursday, Feb. 28, 2019, in Hanoi. At front right is Kim Yong Chol, a North
Korean senior ruling party official and former intelligence chief. At left is
national security adviser John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo,
second from left. (AP)
Asked by a member of the White House press pool about his
outlook for Thursday's summit, Kim said: "It's too early to say. I won't
make predictions. But I instinctively feel that a good outcome will be
produced."
South Korea's Unification Ministry, which deals in
affairs with North Korea, couldn't confirm whether it was the first time Kim
answered a question from a foreign journalist.
Asked if he was willing to allow the U.S. to open an
office in Pyongyang, Kim said through a translator, "I think that is
something which is welcomable."
Reporters didn't get opportunities to ask questions of
Kim during his three summits with South Korean President Moon Jae-in and his
four meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Kim ignored questions shouted
at him during his first summit with Trump last June in Singapore.
Trump, speaking next to Kim at the Sofitel Legend
Metropole Hanoi hotel, said that "a lot of great ideas" are
"being thrown about." He asserted that "when you have a good
relationship, a lot of good things happen."
"I just want to say: I have great respect for
Chairman Kim, and I have great respect for his country," Trump told
reporters as he sat at a table across from Kim in Hanoi. "And I believe it
will be something -- hard to compete with for other countries. It has such
potential."
Kim, meanwhile, said the "whole world" was
watching the talks and suggested that, for some, the image of the two
"sitting side by side" must resemble "a fantasy movie."
People
watch a TV screen showing U.S. President Donald Trump's press conference,
during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea,
Thursday, Feb. 28, 2019. (AP)
Trump added that while reaching a lasting agreement was
critical, "speed is not important." The two leaders then retired to
begin their negotiations privately, but were photographed shortly afterward
walking on the Metropole hotel's pool patio, where they were joined by
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and North Korean official Kim Yong Chol.
The group then went into a glass-enclosed area and sat
down around a table for more talks.
Last year, at the Singapore summit, Trump caught U.S.
ally South Korea off guard by announcing the suspension of major U.S. military
exercises with the South. Trump critics said he squandered critical U.S.
leverage before the North had taken any concrete steps toward denuclearization.
As Thursday's talks were ongoing, Moon, the South
Korean leader, said he plans to offer new proposals for inter-Korean
engagement following the high-stakes nuclear summit. Moon's announcement is
planned for a Friday ceremony marking the 100th anniversary of a 1919 uprising
by Koreans against Japan's colonial rule and will likely include plans for
economic cooperation between the rival Koreas.
President
Donald Trump waves as he boards Air Force One after a summit with North Korean
leader Kim Jong Un, Thursday, Feb. 28, 2019, in Hanoi. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
But after the summit, South Korea's presidential office
said it was "unfortunate" that Trump and Kim had failed to
produce an agreement. But South Korea said it expects "active
dialogue" to continue between Washington and Pyongyang.
The Blue House said Thursday it believes Washington and
Pyongyang deepened their understandings of each other during their "long
and deep discussions" in Hanoi.
It said Trump raising the possibility of sanctions
relief in exchange for nuclear disarmament steps from the North shows that the
nuclear negotiations between the countries have entered an "elevated
level."
The collapse of the Trump-Kim summit could prove to be a
setback for Moon, whose ambitions for inter-Korean engagement hinge on a
nuclear breakthrough between Washington and Pyongyang.
Air Force One is scheduled to refuel in Anchorage,
Alaska, before returning to Joint Base Andrews outside Washington late
Thursday.
The Associated Press contributed to this
report.
