Trump-Kim summit: US president blames failure of talks on North Korea's demand for sanctions to be dropped
Follow the latest updates on the historic meeting
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Your support makes all the difference.Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un have cut short their talks in Hanoi, Vietnam and skipped a scheduled lunch event.
The White House confirmed the summit had ended with “no agreement reached” as the leaders headed back to their respective hotels.
The US president talks broke down over North Korea’s demands on US-led sanctions.
“Basically, they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, but we couldn’t do that,” he told reporters. “Sometimes you have to walk.”
Sarah Sanders, the White House press secretary, said negotiations would continue at a future date.
Several Democrats came out acknowledging Mr Trump’s decision to walk away without a deal was the right move in this situation. Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff said walking away with no deal was better than agreeing to a bad deal, before adding that it was “the result of a poorly planned strategy.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer echoed similar statements, citing his concerns about the likelihood of a bad deal forming out of the summit.
“A deal that fell short of complete denuclearization would have only made North Korea stronger & the world less safe,” Mr Schumer said.
After the summit, Mr Trump also defended Mr Kim over the tragic death of American college student Otto Warmbier, who was jailed in North Korea in December 2015 for attempting to steal propaganda material during an organised tour.The president said he does not believe the autocratic leader was aware of Mr Warmbier’s condition in the North Korean hard labour prison camp.
"He tells me he didn't know about it, and I will take him at his word,” Mr Trump said.
After two years of imprisonment, North Korean authorities returned Mr Warbier to the US in a coma in July 2017. A few days later, the 22-year-old died in his hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio.
Ohio Senators Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman criticised the American president’s defense of Mr Kim.
“I’m very concerned that the President didn’t seem to be all that concerned about the murder of Otto Warmbier from Cincinnati,” Mr Brown told reporters on Thursday. “I don’t know how he says he likes the dictator of NK so much.”
Mr Portman insists that Mr Trump and the American people must remember Mr Warmbier and that “we should never let North Korea off the hook for what they did to him."
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Following Mr Trump’s opening remarks, Mr Kim said “a lot of obstacles” had been overcome to hold the meeting in Hanoi, and that he had confidence there would be a good result.
Screengrab
Donald Trump was asked by a reporter if he had any response to the testimony of his former personal lawyer Michael Cohen, which was published earlier today. Mr Trump seemed to ignore the question.
The two leaders smiled as they met.
Mr Trump described Mr Kim as a "great leader" and spoke about North Korea's economic potential.
Reuters
Here is the moment the two men met for the second time, at their summit in the Metropole hotel in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Reuters
US president Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong-un opened their second summit on Wednesday with hopeful words and a private chat before sitting down for dinner and further talks about North Korea's pursuit of nuclear weapons.
The two exchanged smiles and a warm handshake in front of alternating American and North Korean flags. They posed for cameras before disappearing for their private discussion, in a similar arrangement to the one they had at their first historic meeting last year in Singapore.
“We made a lot of progress,” Mr Trump said of their first summit. “I think the biggest progress was our relationship, is really a good one.”
Asked if this summit would yield a political declaration to end the Korean War, Mr Trump said: “We'll see.”
Kim said he was “confident of achieving the great results that everyone will welcome.”
The pair were briefly photographed during their dinner meeting, during which Mr Trump reiterated his high hopes for the summit.
AP
The White House is restricting press access to president Donald Trump's summit in Vietnam with North Korea's Kim Jong-un.
Four print reporters, including one from the Associated Press, were prohibited from covering the beginning of Mr Trump's dinner with Mr Kim in Hanoi on Wednesday. That came after two of those reporters asked questions of the president during earlier events at the summit.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders released a statement which said due to the “sensitive nature of the meetings we have limited the pool for dinner to a smaller group”.
Ms Sanders initially said no reporters would be allowed into the dinner. But after photographers said they would not cover it without an editorial presence, one print reporter and a radio reporter were allowed in.
Journalists and media outlets are reacting to the reports that several US journalists were barred from covering the face-to-face meeting between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders defended the decision to cut Jon Lemire and Jeff Mason out of the president’s first media availability with the North Korean regime leader in a statement, saying it was made “due to the sensitive nature of the meeting.”
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