This photograph supplied by the North Korean authorities, reveals North Korean chief Kim Jong Un speaks throughout a parliament session on the Supreme Individuals’s Meeting, which was held on Sept. 20-21, 2025 in Pyongyang, North Korea.
Korean Central Information Company/Korea Information Service by way of AP/KCNA by way of KNS
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Korean Central Information Company/Korea Information Service by way of AP/KCNA by way of KNS
SEOUL – North Korean chief Kim Jong Un stated there is no such thing as a purpose to not resume stalled negotiations with the U.S., if Washington drops its “obsession” with eliminating North Korea’s nuclear weapons.
It will look like Kim’s clearest message of his willingness to satisfy with president Trump and revive diplomacy that has been stalled since 2019.
“If the U.S. drops its hollow obsession with denuclearization and wants to pursue peaceful coexistence with North Korea based on the recognition of reality, there is no reason for us not to sit down with the U.S.,” Kim advised a assembly of North Korea’s legislature, the Supreme Individuals’s Meeting.
“Personally, I still have good memories of U.S. President Trump,” Kim added.
Kim and Trump met in Singapore, Vietnam and the inter-Korean border in 2018 and 2019, throughout Trump’s first administration, however failed to succeed in a deal on denuclearization in alternate for lifting sanctions on Pyongyang.
Kim added that North Korea developed nuclear weapons to make sure its survival, and it has written its irreversible nuclear standing into its structure.
“The world already knows well what the United States does after forcing other countries to give up their nuclear weapons and disarm,” he stated. Kim and North Korean officers have repeatedly cited Iraq and Libya as states that the U.S. has disarmed earlier than backing management change.
President Trump advised visiting South Korean President Lee Jae Myung final month that he want to meet with Kim Jong Un this yr. He has repeatedly referred to North Korea as a “nuclear power.”
That suggests recognizing North Korea as a nuclear state, which is one thing earlier U.S. administrations and overseas governments have persistently opposed.
In a gathering in July, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and South Korean Overseas Minister reaffirmed their governments’ intention to comprehend the denuclearization of North Korea.
Ought to Trump and Kim meet once more this yr, Trump would discover Kim in a far stronger negotiating place, with a bigger nuclear arsenal and stronger backing from Russia and China.
Kim illustrated this level at a navy parade in Beijing this month, the place he appeared collectively for the primary time with Russian President Vladimir Putin and China’s chief Xi Jinping.
Whereas leaving the door open to the U.S., Kim appeared to slam one other one on South Korea shut.
“We will never unify with a country that entrusts its politics and defense to a foreign power,” Kim stated, calling inter-Korean unification “unnecessary.”
Final yr, Kim stated North Korea was abandoning its long-held aim of eventual reunification with the South, and severed all communications.
Since taking workplace in June, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung has prolonged olive branches to the North, corresponding to halting propaganda broadcasts into the North, however he has been repeatedly rebuffed.
Lee has outlined a plan for denuclearizing North Korea in three steps: freezing, decreasing and finally dismantling the North’s nuclear arsenal.
He says he’ll persist along with his efforts to revive peace and belief with the North, regardless of Pyongyang’s chilly shoulder.
