US, South Korea, Japan Vow Complete North Korea Denuclearization
The US, South Korea and Japan reaffirmed their commitment to North Korea’s complete denuclearization as Pyongyang rejects disarmament ahead of possible talks.
ERBIL (Kurdistan24) - The United States, South Korea and Japan have reaffirmed their commitment to the “complete denuclearization” of North Korea, as Pyongyang (the Capital of North Korea) continues to reject disarmament ahead of possible talks with Washington.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun and Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi “reaffirmed their resolute commitment to the complete denuclearization” of North Korea, the US State Department said.
The three met on Friday, on the sidelines of a Group of 20 (G20) meeting in Atlanta, in the US state of Georgia.
They also pledged “full implementation” of UN Security Council resolutions, including a ban on supporting revenue for North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
North Korea, which is backed by Russia and China, has enshrined its status as a nuclear-armed state in law despite long-running UN sanctions. Its regime has repeatedly declared its atomic arsenal permanent and irreversible.
Speculation is mounting over a possible meeting between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at next month’s APEC summit in China.
Trump has made repeated overtures to Pyongyang for nuclear talks while scaling back joint military drills with ally South Korea.
Last year, Trump broke with long-held US policy by conceding that North Korea was already “sort of a nuclear power,” while reaching out to Pyongyang for talks.
He said he was “100 percent” open to a meeting, a suggestion that went unanswered.
Analysts and South Korea’s spy agency say Kim may have conveyed Pyongyang’s position on potential talks with Trump to Beijing during a recent visit to the Chinese border city of Dandong.
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, who has repeatedly offered Pyongyang talks without preconditions, suggested in September that Washington seek a freeze, rather than the immediate elimination, of the North’s nuclear program in return for sanctions relief.
Critics have said such an approach risks tacitly accepting North Korea as a nuclear-armed state while allowing Pyongyang to win sanctions relief without giving up its arsenal.
Analysts say China may also be moving toward tacit acceptance. They point to the omission of North Korean denuclearization from statements after Kim and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in June.
On Saturday, Oct. 31, Pyongyang denounced a joint statement by a group of nations monitoring the implementation of sanctions against it. It vowed that “the stereotyped sanctions racket of the US and the West can neither influence the position of the DPRK (North Korea) as a nuclear weapons state.”