Kim Jong-Un’s powerful sister opened up about relations with the second Trump administration, warning the U.S. not to try to restart talks centered on getting North Korea to give up its nuclear program.
Kim Yo Jong, in remarks blasted out by state media, said relations between President Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un are ‘not bad’ but added Pyongyang would view any attempt to pressure North Korea to denuclearize as ‘nothing but a mockery.’
She said that North Korea’s nuclear arsenal has sharply increased since Trump and Kim last spoke, and the pair would not meet for a summit again if denuclearization was on the table.
The North Korean dictator’s sister did not rule out bilateral talks entirely — as she did with South Korea in a separate statement.
‘If the U.S. fails to accept the changed reality and persists in the failed past, the DPRK- U.S. meeting will remain as a ‘hope’ of the U.S. side,’ Kim Yo Jong said, referring to the nation by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
She said it would be ‘advisable to seek another way of contact.’
Trump held three unprecedented summits with the North Korean leader he dubbed ‘Little Rocket Man’ during his first term: in Singapore in 2018, Hanoi in 2019 and the Korean Demilitarized Zone in 2019, becoming the first president to step foot on North Korean territory.
None of the meetings resulted in any breakthroughs: North Korea kept its nukes, and the U.S. left sanctions that have isolated it from international markets in place.
Kim Yo Jong is a top official on the Central Committee of the North’s ruling Workers’ Party and handles relations with the U.S. and South Korea.
Kim Yo Jong’s comments came after an article posted by Yonhap news agency cited an unnamed White House official as saying Trump ‘remains open to engaging with Leader Kim to achieve a fully denuclearized North Korea.’
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said last month Trump would like to see ‘progress’ this term on the summits he held during the first term.
In a statement commemorating the 72nd anniversary of the end of the Korean War on Monday, Trump said, ‘I was proud to become the first sitting President to cross this Demilitarized Zone into North Korea.’
He underscored the U.S. alliance with South Korea.
‘Although the evils of communism still persist in Asia, American and South Korean forces remain united in an ironclad alliance to this day.’