Trump says planned summit with Kim Jong-un may not take place next month as planned

AS US President Donald Trump welcomed South Korea’s president to the White House, he cast doubt over a planned June summit with Kim Jong-un.

US President Donald Trump says a scheduled summit with Kim Jong-un may not take place next month as planned, despite his belief the North Korean leader is “serious” about denuclearisation.

“It may not work out for June 12,” Mr Trump said, being characteristically coy about the prospects for the historic meeting in Singapore.

In what was anticipated as a high stakes and potentially testy meeting that could decide whether Mr Trump’s much-vaunted summit with Kim went ahead at all, the US president welcomed South Korea’s president to the White House overnight.

“If it does not happen, maybe it will happen later,” Mr Trump said, as he began talks with South Korean President Moon Jae-in.

President Donald Trump welcomes South Korean President Moon Jae-in to the White House in Washington. Picture: AP

But Mr Trump added that he did believe the North Korean leader was willing to give up nukes, amid fears about apparent North Korean backpedaling.

“I do think he is serious. I think he is absolutely very serious,” Mr Trump said, again raising the prospect of a windfall for Kim if he mothballed weapons programs.

“He will be extremely happy,” Mr Trump said of Kim, if the deal worked out. “He will be very happy.”

Mr Trump offered a friendly smile and a handshake to Moon, who is in Washington to try and salvage a rare diplomatic opening between the US and North Korea that is in trouble almost before it begins.

MORE: Why North Korea desperately needs a deal

President Donald Trump meets with South Korean President Moon Jae-In in Washington overnight. Picture: AP

Mr Trump had agreed to meet inscrutable “Supreme Leader” Kim in Singapore on June 12, but doubt was cast as both sides expressed reservations.

“I would still contend that this time is different,” South Korean ambassador Cho Yoon-je wrote in the Washington Post on the eve of his president’s visit.

“We must still give hope a chance, even though there are miles to go and the road will be bumpy.”

South Korea — worried about Kim’s bellicose weapons testing and Mr Trump’s similarly warnings about “fire and fury” — was instrumental in convincing the two Cold War foes to sit down and talk.

Moon sent his own national security advisor to the White House in March, carrying an offer of talks and word that North Korea may be willing to abandon nuclear weapons, an enticing prospect.

A commemorative coin for the now in doubt US-North Korea summit. Picture: AFP

Mr Trump surprised his guests, his own aides and the world by summarily accepting the meeting, seeing an opportunity to “do a deal” and avoid military confrontation.

Pyongyang is on the verge of marrying nuclear and missile technology allowing it to hit the continental United States with a nuke, a capability Washington sees as wholly unacceptable.

Since then, there has been a landmark series of intra-Korean meetings, two trips to Pyongyang by Mike Pompeo — first as CIA director then as America’s top diplomat — and three American citizens have been released from the North.

But after several Trumpian victory laps, North Korea’s willingness to denuclearise is now in serious doubt.

Earlier this month, North Korea denounced US demands for “unilateral nuclear abandonment” and cancelled at the last minute a high-level meeting with the South in protest over joint military drills between Seoul and Washington.

Mr Trump responded by saying the meeting may or may not take place.

Vice President Mike Pence warned in an interview on Monday night that there was “no question” Mr Trump would be prepared to walk away from the talks with Kim if it looked like they would not yield results, and the president was not just after a public relations triumph.

US President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence at a ceremony on Monday. Picture: Getty Images/AFP

Mr Pence claimed both the Clinton and Bush administrations “got played” by North Korea when Washington previously tried to get Pyongyang to denuclearise, but that the current administration would not make the same mistakes.

“It would be a great mistake for Kim Jong-un to think he could play Donald Trump,” he told Fox News.

Mr Trump also surprised many by offering Kim an upfront security guarantee, allowing him to stay in power, and suggested that Kim’s apparent about-face may have been at the behest of Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

“It could very well be that he’s influencing Kim Jong-un,” Mr Trump said, citing a recent meeting between the pair, their second in a month’s time. “We’ll see what happens.”

East Asian Affairs expert Robert Kelly said the Moon administration overstated North Korea’s willingness to deal. Picture: AFP

Analysts saw North Korea’s perceived slow peddling as evidence of what they feared all along, that Pyongyang may have been playing for time — hoping to ease sanctions and “maximum pressure,” or of South Korea overtorquing the prospects of a deal.

“The current episode of tension reflects a wide and dangerous expectation gap between the United States and North Korea,” said Eric Gomez of the CATO Institute.

“Denuclearisation is not off the table for the North, but it expects the United States to end the so-called ‘hostile policy’ as a precondition for denuclearisation.”

It is far from clear what that means concretely, but it could include the withdrawal of 30,000 US troops from the Korean peninsula.

With just weeks to go and little clarity on what will be discussed or what happens if talks fail, some Korea watchers predict fireworks during Mr Trump’s talks with Moon.

“It increasingly looks like the Moon administration overstated North Korea’s willingness to deal. Moon will probably get an earful over that,” said Robert Kelly of Pusan National University.

Yonhap news agency quoted a Blue House official as saying Moon would “likely tell President Trump what to expect and what not to expect from Kim.”