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North Korea pledged on Sunday to shut down its atomic test site in May, Seoul said on Sunday. Pyongyang also invited US weapons experts to visit the country.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s reported promise follows weeks of whirlwind diplomacy that saw the leaders of North and South Korea agree to pursue the complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula during a historic summit between Kim and the South's President Moon Jae-in on Friday.
"Kim said, during the summit with President Moon, that he would carry out the closing of the nuclear test site in May, and would soon invite experts of South Korea and the US as well as journalists to disclose the process to the international community with transparency," Seoul's presidential spokesman Yoon Young-chan said.
"Kim said 'the US feels repulsive about us, but once we talk, they will realize that I am not a person who will fire a nuclear weapon to the South or the US or target the US," according to Yoon.
"If we meet often (with the US), build trust, end the war and eventually are promised no invasion, why would we live with the nuclear weapons?'"
The remarks are likely to be seen as a sweetener ahead of US President Donald Trump's own planned summit with Kim, which the US leader said would take place "in the next three or four weeks".
Trump has been eager to play up his role in achieving a breakthrough with Pyongyang through what the White House has called a "Maximum Pressure Campaign" consisting of tough rhetoric, strengthened global sanctions and diplomatic efforts to further isolate the authoritarian regime.
"If we would have said where we are today from three or four months -- months ago, do you remember what they were saying? 'He's going to get us into nuclear war, they said,'" he told supporters in Washington Township, north of Detroit.
He added: "No, strength is going to keep us out of nuclear war, not going to get us in!"
But he also sounded a note of caution, saying he was prepared to walk away if US demands for North Korea to relinquish its atomic arsenal were not met.
His remarks came as extracts from an interview with his new Secretary of State Mike Pompeo were released.
Washington's chief diplomat told ABC News he had a "good conversation" with Kim during his secret visit to Pyongyang over the Easter weekend, adding that the North Korean leader was "prepared to... lay out a map that would help us achieve" denuclearization.
Trump held phone calls earlier Saturday with both Moon and Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, declaring "things are going very well", as CBS News reported that Mongolia and Singapore are the final two sites under consideration for his meeting with Kim.
It was unclear whether North Korea would host US experts at its Punggye-ri underground testing site before or after the summit.
Kim slammed speculation during his meeting with Moon that the test site was already unusable after Pyongyang conducted its largest ever nuclear test there last September.
"Some people are saying that we are terminating a test site that is already useless, but, as they will see once they visit, there are two more tunnels (in the test site) that are even bigger... and they are in good condition," he said, according to the South's presidential spokesman.
Last year, Pyongyang carried out its sixth nuclear test and launched missiles capable of reaching the US mainland.
Its actions sent tensions soaring as Kim and Trump traded personal insults and threats of war.
Washington is pressing for the North to give up its weapons in a complete, verifiable and irreversible way. Pyongyang is demanding as yet unspecified security guarantees to discuss its arsenal.
Later on Sunday, Kim announced that he would move the country's clocks 30 minutes forward to unify with the South's time zone as a conciliatory gesture in wake of Friday’s historic inter-Korean summit.
The two countries on the divided peninsula have had different time zones since 2015 when the North suddenly changed its standard time to 30 minutes behind the South.
Pyongyang cited a nationalistic rationale, saying it would return the North to the time zone used before Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule of the peninsula to mark the 70th anniversary of its liberation from Tokyo.
But Kim promised to change the time zone back during his summit with Moon, Yoon said.
Kim said he found it "heartbreaking" to see the two wall clocks hanging at the summit room showing different times for the two neighbors, the spokesman added.
"Since we were the ones who made the change from the standard time, we will go back to the original time. You can announce it publicly," Yoon quoted Kim as saying.
Yoon hailed the move as a "symbolic move" for better ties between Seoul and Pyongyang.
https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/1252646/north-korea-vows-shut-atomic-site-may
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s reported promise follows weeks of whirlwind diplomacy that saw the leaders of North and South Korea agree to pursue the complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula during a historic summit between Kim and the South's President Moon Jae-in on Friday.
"Kim said, during the summit with President Moon, that he would carry out the closing of the nuclear test site in May, and would soon invite experts of South Korea and the US as well as journalists to disclose the process to the international community with transparency," Seoul's presidential spokesman Yoon Young-chan said.
"Kim said 'the US feels repulsive about us, but once we talk, they will realize that I am not a person who will fire a nuclear weapon to the South or the US or target the US," according to Yoon.
"If we meet often (with the US), build trust, end the war and eventually are promised no invasion, why would we live with the nuclear weapons?'"
The remarks are likely to be seen as a sweetener ahead of US President Donald Trump's own planned summit with Kim, which the US leader said would take place "in the next three or four weeks".
Trump has been eager to play up his role in achieving a breakthrough with Pyongyang through what the White House has called a "Maximum Pressure Campaign" consisting of tough rhetoric, strengthened global sanctions and diplomatic efforts to further isolate the authoritarian regime.
"If we would have said where we are today from three or four months -- months ago, do you remember what they were saying? 'He's going to get us into nuclear war, they said,'" he told supporters in Washington Township, north of Detroit.
He added: "No, strength is going to keep us out of nuclear war, not going to get us in!"
But he also sounded a note of caution, saying he was prepared to walk away if US demands for North Korea to relinquish its atomic arsenal were not met.
His remarks came as extracts from an interview with his new Secretary of State Mike Pompeo were released.
Washington's chief diplomat told ABC News he had a "good conversation" with Kim during his secret visit to Pyongyang over the Easter weekend, adding that the North Korean leader was "prepared to... lay out a map that would help us achieve" denuclearization.
Trump held phone calls earlier Saturday with both Moon and Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, declaring "things are going very well", as CBS News reported that Mongolia and Singapore are the final two sites under consideration for his meeting with Kim.
It was unclear whether North Korea would host US experts at its Punggye-ri underground testing site before or after the summit.
Kim slammed speculation during his meeting with Moon that the test site was already unusable after Pyongyang conducted its largest ever nuclear test there last September.
"Some people are saying that we are terminating a test site that is already useless, but, as they will see once they visit, there are two more tunnels (in the test site) that are even bigger... and they are in good condition," he said, according to the South's presidential spokesman.
Last year, Pyongyang carried out its sixth nuclear test and launched missiles capable of reaching the US mainland.
Its actions sent tensions soaring as Kim and Trump traded personal insults and threats of war.
Washington is pressing for the North to give up its weapons in a complete, verifiable and irreversible way. Pyongyang is demanding as yet unspecified security guarantees to discuss its arsenal.
Later on Sunday, Kim announced that he would move the country's clocks 30 minutes forward to unify with the South's time zone as a conciliatory gesture in wake of Friday’s historic inter-Korean summit.
The two countries on the divided peninsula have had different time zones since 2015 when the North suddenly changed its standard time to 30 minutes behind the South.
Pyongyang cited a nationalistic rationale, saying it would return the North to the time zone used before Japan's 1910-45 colonial rule of the peninsula to mark the 70th anniversary of its liberation from Tokyo.
But Kim promised to change the time zone back during his summit with Moon, Yoon said.
Kim said he found it "heartbreaking" to see the two wall clocks hanging at the summit room showing different times for the two neighbors, the spokesman added.
"Since we were the ones who made the change from the standard time, we will go back to the original time. You can announce it publicly," Yoon quoted Kim as saying.
Yoon hailed the move as a "symbolic move" for better ties between Seoul and Pyongyang.
https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/1252646/north-korea-vows-shut-atomic-site-may
