WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump is canceling the planned June 12 summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, citing the “tremendous anger and open hostility” in a recent statement from North Korea.
Trump says in a letter to Kim released Thursday by the White House that based on the statement, he felt it was “inappropriate, at this time, to have this long-planned meeting.”
The president says the North Koreans talk about their nuclear capabilities, “but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.”
Trump also said that the US is more ready than it has ever been before to counter any North Korea threat and that the US military is 'ready if necessary' to respond to a 'foolish or reckless act' by North Korea.
Later, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that North Korea did not respond to repeated requests from U.S. officials to discuss logistics for the now-canceled summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Pompeo told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday that the lack of response was an additional reason for Trump's decision to call off the meeting. Trump cited recent bellicose comments from the North in a letter to Kim released by the White House.
Pompeo added that "We had received no response to our inquiries from them." and that the North's attitude changed markedly since he returned from a trip to Pyongyang earlier this month, when he met with Kim and secured the release of three American prisoners being held there.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres voiced deep disappointment on Thursday at the cancelation of the planned meeting next month between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Guterres, in remarks delivered at the University of Geneva, said: “I am deeply concerned by the cancelation of the planned meeting in Singapore between the President of the United States and the leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.”
He urged the parties to continue their dialogue so as to “find a path to the peaceful and verifiable denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”
