South Korean President Moon Jae-in expressed hope yesterday that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the United States will continue their talks to strike a deal on denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
Moon made the remarks during a plenary session of the National Security Council in Seoul, according to the presidential Blue House.
Moon last presided over an NSC meeting about nine months ago on June 14, 2018, two days after the first summit between DPRK leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump in Singapore.
Kim and Trump ended their second meeting in the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi last week without any agreement.
“We wish the two countries continue to talk. (We) hope the two leaders will meet again as soon as possible to strike the delayed deal,” said Moon.
Moon said it would never be desirable for Pyongyang and Washington to halt dialogue for long, and he believed that the two sides would reach an agreement “in the end.”
He said South Korea could play a significant role in helping the two sides strike a deal, indicating his willingness to broker a compromise between the DPRK and the US.
The president instructed the NSC to make efforts for the rapid resumption of working-level talks between Pyongyang and Washington and find measures to resume the DPRK-US dialogue through the development of inter-Korean relations without violating global sanctions.
Moon said the second DPRK-US summit confirmed “very important fruits” that the two sides bore through dialogue, noting that Kim and Trump discussed the dismantling of the DPRK’s Yongbyon nuclear complex.
He said the verifiable dismantling of the Yongbyon nuclear facility, which he said is a core of the DPRK’s nuclear program, was within a possible range.
If all the plutonium-reprocessing and uranium-enrichment facilities in Yongbyon are completely dismantled, it will mark an irreversible phase for the peninsula’s denuclearization.
Moon said relief from sanctions against Pyongyang was also discussed at the Hanoi summit, which he called great progress as it meant the two sides had entered a phase of trading denuclearization and corresponding measures.
During the Hanoi summit, Kim and Trump discussed the establishment of US liaison office in Pyongyang that has a “great meaning” in the work toward normalized relations between the DPRK and the US, the South Korean leader noted.
Source: https://archive.shine.cn/world/Moon-hopeful-over-DPRKUS-nuclear-deal/shdaily.shtml
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