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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As Donald Trump dines with Kim Jong Un, his former attorney is preparing to deliver an explosive testimony back home on Capitol Hill.
Among those explosive claims — Cohen will say Mr Trump “was a presidential candidate who knew that Roger Stone was talking with Julian Assange about a WikiLeaks drop of Democratic National Committee emails” — include the president telling his former attorney there was no real medical excuse behind his military deferral during the Vietnam War.
“Mr Trump tasked me to handle the negative press surrounding his medical deferment from the Vietnam draft," Cohen said in his prepared remarks on Wednesday. “Mr Trump claimed it was because of a bone spur, but when I asked for medical records, he gave me none and said there was no surgery."
Donald Trump repeated his claims that North Korea could become on the world’s “great economic powers” during his face-to-face summit with Kim Jong UN on Wednesday, telling the dictator, “I think that your country has tremendous economic potential. Unbelievable. Unlimited. And I think that you will have a tremendous future … I look forward to watching it happen, and helping it to happen.”
Former Senior Director for Arms Control and Nonproliferation at the National Security Council Jon Wolfsthal tells The Independent that Donald Trump “undermined his negotiators” who were working to advance denuclearisation efforts with North Korean officials ahead of his second summit with Kim Jong Un.
“Trump claimed in the campaign that only he can solve problems,” Mr Wolfsthal said in an interview that will appear on The Independent today. “Thus it is predictable that he has undermined his negotiators routinely and make it less likely that lower level North Koreans would engage with their US counterparts.”
The White House just posted the following video from Donald Trump's first media availability with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un:
A major question remains surrounding Mr Trump’s second summit with the North Korean leader about what exactly his administration hopes to accomplish during the historic event. Whereas the North has sought a peace declaration that would effectively end the longstanding Korean War — Mr Trump said “We’ll see” about that happening before the two sat down for nuclear talks on Wednesday — the US has sought verifiable evidence of the North’s denuclearisation.
Donald Trump and Kim Jong UN enjoyed Hanoi-style deep-fried spring rolls and king crab meat and spinach soaked in a seafood broth as their appetizers during a highly-anticipated dinner in Hanoi, Vietnam, according to pool reports.
Journalists on the scene have described a chaotic scene in which schedules, itineraries and even dinner menu arrangements have been changing at the last minute:
North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un told reporters he had a “very interesting dialogue” with Donald Trump following the pair’s meeting on Wednesday in Hanoi, Vietnam.
The US president also said it was a “good” conversation, telling reporters, “Boy, if you could have heard the dialogue, what you would pay for that dialogue?”
↵Interestingly, as Donald Trump is in Vietnam to meet with Kim Jong Un, his former attorney is discussing explosive details about the president's alleged crimes and wrongdoings in front of the House Oversight Committee back in Washington.
Among those revelations include statements the president has made about avoiding the Vietnam War. Here's more:
Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un have returned to their hotels for the night and are expected to resume conversations tomorrow. Here’s pool report photos showing the streets of Hanoi, Vietnam, as their motorcades returned from the high-profile dinner shared by both leaders.
Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un have returned to their hotels for the night and are expected to resume conversations tomorrow. Here’s pool report photos showing the streets of Hanoi, Vietnam, as their motorcades returned from the high-profile dinner shared by both leaders.
Donald Trump will resume high-profile meetings with Kim Jong Un tomorrow morning, according to the White House, before a noon lunch. A “joint agreement signing ceremony” will follow shortly after around 2:00pm local time.
The US president is then scheduled to hold a press conference at 3:50pm local time.
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