Donald Trump: I will invite Kim Jong-un to the US

Donald Trump will normalise relations with North Korea and invite Kim Jong-un to the White House if he denuclearises.

Donald Trump says he would normalise relations with North Korea and invite Kim Jong-un to the White House if he rids his country of nuclear weapons.

The president said the success of next week’s leader’s summit in Singapore would depend on Mr Kim’s attitude and willingness to strike a deal that could change the world.

“We have the potential to so something incredible for the world and its my honour to be involved.” Mr Trump said in a White House joint press conference with Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

“It’s about attitude. It’s about willingness to get things done … this isn’t a question of preparation. It’s a question of whether or not people want it to happen. And we’ll know that very quickly,” Mr Trump said.

The president was speaking ahead of his historic visit to Singapore next Tuesday where he will become the first sitting US president to meet with a leader of North Korea.

Although Mr Trump cautioned that anything could happen, the president said he believed Mr Kim was potentially willing to make a deal.

“I really believe there is a potential to make a deal … I really believe Kim Jong-un wants to do something that is great for his people,” he said.

But he also said ‘you have to be able to walk away’ if it is clear the North Korean leader is not serious about denuclearisation.

“This will not be just a photo op. This will be — at a minimum, we’ll start with, perhaps, a good relationship. And that’s something that’s very important toward the ultimate making of a deal. I’d love to say it could happen in one deal, and maybe it can. They have to denuke. If they don’t denuclearise, that will not be acceptable.”

Mr Trump said that the US would maintain sanctions on the regime, although they no longer refer to the policy as ‘maximum pressure’, and he warned the US would levy more sanctions if the talks break down.

“We cannot take sanctions off; the sanctions are extraordinarily powerful. We cannot — and I could add a lot more, but I don’t — I’ve chosen not to do that at this time. But that may happen.”

The president said that if Mr Kim fulfilled his pledge to get rid of his nuclear weapons the US would be happy to normalise relations between the two countries, which do not currently have diplomatic relations. He said he would even be happy to invite Mr Kim to the White House.

“Normalising relations is something I would expect to do after everything is complete,” he said. “We would certainly like to see normalisation, yes.”

Mr Trump did not go into details about exactly what he would demand of Mr Kim beyond a promise to denuclearise his country. He said that if the two leaders got on well, there would likely be a process involving several more meetings to work out the details of how denuclearisation would be achieved.

“I think it’s a process; I’ve told you that many times before. I think it’s not a one meeting deal. It will be wonderful if it were. You know, they’ve been doing this for a long time. There’s been a lot of enemies out there. A lot of dislike, a lot of hatred between countries,” he said.

Mr Abe thanked Mr Trump for his leadership on the issue of North Korea and said that if relations were eventually normalised with Pyongyang, Japan would be willing to invest heavily to help the poverty-stricken country rebuild itself.

“My sincere hope is that the upcoming planned US-North Korea summit meeting will serve as an opportunity through which we will have greater peace and stability, and also this will be a dramatic and transformational moment in terms of the situation in the Northeast Asia,” Mr Abe said.

Cameron Stewart is also US Contributor for Sky News Australia