It’s official: Trump is meeting Kim Jong Un in Singapore on June 12
By Zack Beauchamp, May 10, 2018
President Donald Trump just announced the location and date of his upcoming meeting with Kim Jong Un: They will meet in Singapore on June 12.
“We will both try to make it a very special moment for World Peace!” the president tweeted. The Singaporean ministry of foreign affairs confirmed the time and place of the meeting in a statement to sent to press, adding that they are “pleased to host the meeting.”
https://www.vox.com/world/2018/5/10/173 ... orth-korea
Trump Greets 3 American Detainees Freed From North Korea
By Katie Rogers, May 10, 2018
JOINT BASE ANDREWS, Md. — Three American prisoners freed from North Korea arrived here early Thursday to a personal welcome from President Trump, who traveled to an air base in the middle of the night to meet them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/10/us/p ... ompeo.html
Flashback to 2014
Why Did North Korea Release Kenneth Bae and Matthew Todd Miller?
By Barbara Demick, November 12, 2014
So the seemingly unilateral release, this past weekend, of Kenneth Bae, a forty-six-year-old Korean-American missionary who was detained for more than two years, and Matthew Todd Miller, a twenty-four-year-old man who was arrested in April while on a private tour, raises some questions: What did the North Koreans hope to gain? Was the release simply a bold gesture signalling that North Korea wants to open a dialogue with the United States?
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“Kim Jong-un is a smart young man, and this was a very smart move,” Donald Gregg, who served terms as a C.I.A. station chief and the U.S. Ambassador in Seoul, said of the release of the detainees. “I’ve long sensed that Kim Jong-un is going to change the nature of this country.” Now retired, Gregg has worked in recent years to promote engagement between the United States and North Korea, including presiding over Ambassador Jang’s appearance at the Council on Foreign Relations in October. During a trip to Pyongyang in February, Gregg told me, he met with North Korea’s vice-foreign minister, Ri Yong-ho, who told him to expect Kim to open up the country.
“The sky’s the limit under Kim Jong-un,” Ri reportedly said. Gregg said that Ri also told him, “Kim Jong-un is going to be around for a long time. So, if President Obama doesn’t talk to us, we will just wait for the next President.” For now, the Obama Administration professes to be mystified by the North Koreans’ motives. Asked in Beijing on Monday whether the release of the detainees gave him a better indication of Kim Jong-un’s strategy toward the United States, the President answered with a single word: “No.”