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United States President Donald Trump has said that during his second presidential term he intends to continue to maintain relations with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
The White House chief of staff made the statement during a press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, CNN reports. The American president noted that he considers "it a very big asset for everyone that I get along with him."
“I can tell you that Japan likes this idea because their relationship with them is not very good. If I can build relationships not only with them but with other people around the world where there seems to be difficulty, I think that is a huge advantage for the world, not just the United States,” Trump added.
At the same time, the Japanese Prime Minister, when asked whether he wanted Trump to resume contacts with the North Korean leader, said that this was something the US should decide for itself.
According to Ishiba, Japan and the US will work towards the “complete denuclearization” of the DPRK.
Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un: what were the relations between the leaders like before?
At the beginning of his first presidential term, Donald Trump took a rather tough stance on North Korea. In particular, he said that the United States could “totally destroy” North Korea. Then Trump and Kim also exchanged “courtesies”: the US president said that the leader of the DPRK is a “sick puppy” and a “rocket man”, while Kim Jong-un called his opponent a “mentally deranged dotard”.
Three subsequent meetings took place between the two. Trump became the first sitting US president to meet with a North Korean leader. And in June 2019, he also became the first US president to cross the border into the Demilitarized Zone. That meeting did not lead to any breakthrough.
After that, Trump said that he and Kim Jong-un had a great relationship, and the leaders were exchanging what he called “love messages.”
However, Kim Jong-un continued to work on developing nuclear weapons, and Trump paid less attention to relations with North Korea towards the end of his presidency. When Democrat Joe Biden came to the White House, the United States returned to a more traditional strategy of deterring North Korea, without personal talks between the leaders.
