The details of when and where President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will meet have yet to be finalized, but one location both leaders appear to be agreeable to is Panmunjon in Korea’s Demilitarized Zone.

A Tuesday report from CNN cites an unidentified source as saying Kim has agreed upon the DMZ as a potential location for a meeting with Trump.

It is the same location where Kim meet with South Korean president President Moon Jae-in last weekend and discussed measures for ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

A spokesperson for the South Korean president said Moon believes the DMZ would be the most symbolic place for a meeting between Kim and Trump.

“(We) think Panmunjom is quite meaningful as a place to erode the divide and establish a new milestone for peace,” the spokesperson told reporters. “Wouldn’t Panmunjom be the most symbolic place?”

Trump has already said the location appeals to him, particularly after seeing images of the meetings between the Korean leaders meeting there last week.

“There’s something I like about it, because you’re there, if things work out, there’s a great celebration to be had on the site, not in a third-party country,” Trump said Monday.

The president also floated the idea of a meeting at the DMZ in a tweet early Monday.

But some U.S. officials are still arguing for Singapore as a possible location for the talks, telling Trump it presents a more neutral option without making the U.S. look too conciliatory, according to the New York Post.

Singapore was a close ally to the United States during the Cold War and currently hosts a U.S. military presence. It also has a diplomatic relationship with North Korea, and is one of just 47 countries to feature a North Korean embassy.

But Kim is reluctant to travel long distances by plane, fearing it makes him vulnerable to attack. In addition, the country’s fleet of aircraft is very old.

As a result, Kim’s preferred mode of travel is an armored train originally developed by his father, Kim Jong Il, who was leader of North Korea from 1994 to 2011.

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“(Kim’s) fleet of aircraft are very old and (we’re) just honestly not sure if he can physically get to where he needs to go if its further than a certain number of miles away,” Jenna Gibson, director of communications at the Korea Economic Institute, told CNN. “Ultimately, they need a country where both leaders have the security they need, to have a country where they can meet in common ground … it’s a small number of countries to be honest.”

The Demilitarized Zone has other advantages, according to The New York Times.

“The Secret Service is used to securing the site for presidents, and security could be an issue in other countries, like Mongolia, while there are questions about Mr. Kim’s ability to travel long distances, given the rickety condition of his aircraft. Singapore is safe and politically inoffensive, but it is still 3,074 miles from Pyongyang,” the newspaper reports.

What do you think? Scroll down to comment below.</s>WASHINGTON (AP) - The Latest on the U.S. and North Korea (all times local):

President Donald Trump says withdrawing U.S. troops from South Korea is ‘not on the table’ as he prepares for a historic summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.

Speaking to reporters before boarding Air Force One, Trump says: “Troops are not on the table.”

Trump is addressing a report that he had asked the Pentagon to prepare plans for scaling back the U.S. military presence in South Korea, as he has complained that South Korea does not do enough to financially support that commitment. National security adviser John Bolton called that report, in The New York Times, “utter nonsense” in a statement Friday.

Trump announced Friday that a time and place for his meeting with Kim has been set and will be announced shortly.

President Donald Trump says the time and place has been set for his historic meeting with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.

Speaking to reporters Friday from the White House South Lawn before departing for Dallas, Trump says “we now have a date and we have a location. We’ll be announcing it soon.”

Trump suggested Monday that he was looking for the meeting to be held at the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas. That’s where Kim met with South Korean President Moon Jae-in last Friday.

On Thursday, Vice President Mike Pence postponed a planned trip to Brazil at the end of May to free up resources for Trump’s meeting with Kim.

The White House is denying a published report that President Donald Trump is seeking options to reduce the U.S. troop presence on the Korean peninsula.

The New York Times reported Friday that Trump ordered the Pentagon to prepare options for drawing down U.S. troops in South Korea, just weeks before he meets with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. Trump has expressed frustration that South Korea does not contribute enough to fund U.S. forces that bolster its defenses.

National security adviser John Bolton said Friday that Trump “has not asked the Pentagon to provide options for reducing American forces stationed in South Korea.”

The White House hasn’t said whether Trump is willing to place U.S. troop levels on the negotiating table when he meets with Kim.

The Washington Times is switching its third-party commenting system from Disqus to Spot.IM. You will need to either create an account with Spot.im or if you wish to use your Disqus account look under the Conversation for the link "Have a Disqus Account?". Please read our The Washington Times is switching its third-party commenting system from Disqus to Spot.IM. You will need to either create an account with Spot.im or if you wish to use your Disqus account look under the Conversation for the link "Have a Disqus Account?". Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.</s>WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Expectations grew on Thursday that North Korea would soon release three Americans held as prisoners as a gesture ahead of an unprecedented U.S.-North Korea summit due to take place in coming weeks.

Rudy Giuliani, who joined President Donald Trump’s legal team last month, told Fox News Channel that Pyongyang would release the three prisoners as early as Thursday.

It was not immediately clear whether Giuliani, a former mayor of New York City, had direct knowledge of negotiations around the issue.

Trump administration officials have pressed for the Americans’ release as a show of goodwill by North Korea before the meeting between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, which is expected to take place in late May or early June.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said she could not confirm details about the release, but she said Washington was “cautiously optimistic” about its ongoing talks with Pyongyang.

“Certainly, that would be an incredible step and certainly a sign of goodwill moving into the summit, moving into these discussions with North Korea. I can’t comment any further at this point,” Sanders said in an interview with Fox News.

The three are Korean-American missionary Kim Dong Chul; Kim Sang-duk, who spent a month teaching at the foreign-funded Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) before he was arrested in 2017, and Kim Hak Song, who also taught at PUST.

Trump did not mention Korea or the prisoners when he spoke at a prayer event at the White House on Thursday. “Our country is doing very well. You’ll see some very good announcements very shortly,” he said.

Late on Wednesday, Trump said on Twitter, “As everybody is aware, the past Administration has long been asking for three hostages to be released from a North Korean Labor camp, but to no avail. Stay tuned!”

The U.S. government is looking into reports that the Americans had recently been relocated from a labor camp to a hotel near Pyongyang, a U.S. official said on Wednesday.

CNN, citing an unnamed source, said on Thursday the prisoners’ release was imminent, adding the groundwork for the move was laid two months ago when North Korea’s foreign minister traveled to Sweden and proposed the idea.

In preparing for the summit with Kim, Trump’s administration has said it wants North Korea’s “complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization” but has offered few details of the strategy it will employ at the talks.

Kim told the Chinese government’s top diplomat, State Councillor Wang Yi, on Thursday that he is committed to denuclearization, China’s foreign ministry said, as diplomatic efforts to bring lasting peace to the Korean peninsula gather pace.

“Kim Jong Un said achieving the denuclearization of the peninsula is the firm position of the North Korean side,” China’s foreign ministry said after Wang met Kim in Pyongyang.

North Korea announced on Sunday that it would close its main nuclear test site next month but some U.S. officials are skeptical that Pyongyang will give up its nuclear arsenal.

Trump has promised to ensure that North Korea does not get the capability to build a nuclear bomb that can hit the mainland United States.

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence is postponing his plans to travel to Brazil this month in order to ensure foreign policy resources are focused on Trump’s talks with Kim, Pence’s spokeswoman said.

The exact date and location has yet to be fixed for the meeting between Trump and Kim, who lobbed personal insults and lambasted each other last year over North Korea’s nuclear arms ambitions.

The change in tone has been helped by last week’s meeting between Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, at which the two pledged to work for “complete denuclearization” of the Korean peninsula. Trump said he would maintain pressure on Pyongyang through sanctions ahead of his own meeting with Kim.

Even as Washington presses for the release of the three American prisoners, the parents of a U.S. college student who died last year soon after being release from captivity in North Korea have sued Pyongyang over their son’s death, saying Otto Warmbier was “brutally tortured and murdered.”</s>Those expecting President Donald Trump to make news during his speech Friday afternoon at the NRA's annual convention came away disappointed. Trump didn't unveil any new policies, aside from a sarcastic comment that banning guns makes as much sense as banning vans or trucks. He didn't say the name Stormy Daniels, and talk of Russia or potential collusion was limited to brief aside about his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort.

Friday's Trump was the president at his most comfortable, preaching to an arena-sized choir. He stoked their fears, reassured them of his love and made it clear that there is no better protection than a good guy with a gun.

The NRA's Leadership Forum, as Friday's event was officially known, began with the worst imaginable cover of "Baby Got Back" and a song about Billy Graham's Bible and Willie Nelson's guitar by a country artist Joe Nichols. Then there was a series of media-baiting videos, including NRA talking head Dana Loesch's infamous "violence of lies" piece condemning liberal media, the Pledge of Allegiance and the national anthem.

Finally, almost two hours after the event's promised start time, Vice President Mike Pence appeared before about 7,000 National Rifle Association supporters.

The NRA, Pence told the crowd, is lucky that Trump is in the White House.

"He told you you'd have a friend in the White House," Pence said. "I'm here as his vice president to say that you have two friends in the White House. [While we're in office,] the right of the people to keep and bear arms will not be infringed."

He and the president came to Dallas, Pence said, mostly to thank the NRA and its members for their defense of Constitution.

"There is no greater champion of America's history of gun ownership than you, the men and women of the National Rifle Association," Pence said. The work you do is essential to preserving our freedoms at every level of the American government."

Protests and criticisms against the NRA are simply a result of media representations, Pence said.

"They won't tell the whole story about firearms and America. They focus on the tragedies and the heartbreak, but too often in the media, they ignore it when well-trained, law-abiding citizens save lives," the vice president said. "The Second Amendment is a shield for the rights of all Americans, and it's a shield for the most vulnerable."

Chris Cox, the principal political strategist for the Institute of Legislative Action, the NRA's lobbying arm, next told the cheering crowd there's never been a worse time to be a terrorist or an "overpaid celebrity or athlete who disrespects the flag, thanks to the president." Then, after a wordless appearance onstage by the president's son, Donald Trump Jr., it was the president's turn.

"We love Texas," Trump said before rattling off a string of endorsements for Texas Republicans, including Sen. Ted Cruz, Rep. Pete Sessions, Attorney General Ken Paxton and Paxton's wife, Angela, who's running for state Senate. When the president got to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, he joked about Hurricane Harvey's aftermath.

"Greg, I fully endorse you. You are endorsed," Trump said. "He kept calling and calling, [saying] we need more money. And you know what, we gave it to you."

Like Pence, Trump went to the NRA convention to praise the NRA.

"I want to thank the members of the NRA who defend our rights, our liberty and our great American flag," Trump said. "The rights given to us by God, including the right to self-defense."

No one, he said, would come for NRA members' guns as long as he was president.

"Your Second Amendment rights are under siege, but they will never ever be under siege as long as I am president," Trump said.

As he does in nearly every speech, Trump soon veered from the topic at hand, telling the almost exclusively white crowd about what he views as his growing popularity among black voters.

"Kanye West must have some power," Trump said, "because I doubled my African-American poll numbers. We went from 11 to 22 in one week. Thanks, Kanye." (We assume he meant 11 percent to 22 percent, not 11 people to 22 people.)

The media doesn't tell people about those numbers, Trump said, before touching on Russia for the first and only time during his speech.

"All we hear about is this phony Russia witch-hunt," Trump said to a booing crowd before distancing himself from Manafort, who is facing criminal bank fraud and other charges. "Paul Manafort's a nice guy, but he worked for me for a very short period of time, literally a couple of months."

The charges filed against Manafort by special counsel Robert Mueller are unrelated to him or his campaign, Trump said.

"Let me tell you, folks, we're all fighting battles, but I love fighting these battles," Trump said.

Before eventually circling back to the Second Amendment and the NRA's mission, Trump took a moment to pat himself on the back for the thawing relations between North and South Korea. His rhetoric last year — he called Kim Jong Un "Little Rocket Man" and threatened "fire and fury" against North Korea — helped the two countries and the United States get to where it is today.

"Let me just tell you this: We're really doing well with North Korea," Trump said. "They said, 'Oh, it's going to be terrible,' when the rhetoric was rather sharp. I'm not going to use it now. They were saying, 'This is going to be nuclear war.' No, you know what gets you nuclear war? Weakness gets you nuclear war."

Returning to guns and gun rights, Trump addressed the 17 gun deaths at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, the aftermath of which has led to sustained momentum for increased gun control. The keys to making sure events like the Parkland killings and other mass shootings happen with less frequency, Trump said, are getting rid of gun-free zones and arming teachers.

"There's no sign more inviting to a mass killer than a sign that declares, 'This school is a gun-free zone,'" Trump said. "Come in and take us."

No one, Trump said, is better equipped to protect students than their teachers.

"These teachers love their students, and they aren't going to let anybody hurt their students, but you have to give them a chance," Trump said. "We support the Second Amendment not only because we believe in freedom but because we trust in everyday talented people."

Without everyday people with guns, Trump said, Texas would still be part of Mexico.

"This proud state would not exist if not for a handful of defiant people who refuse to give up their rights more than two centuries ago," Trump said before relating the story of the Battle of Gonzalez to the crowd.

When Trump got to the good part, the part about the flag the Texans in Gonzalez flew to taunt the Mexican army that wanted to take their cannon, the crowd shouted along.

"Come and take it!" Trump said, before the crowd gave him a standing ovation and started a "U-S-A, U-S-A" chant.

Trump told the crowd that anyone who came for their freedoms would have to come through him first.

"We will live free, and we will die free," Trump said.</s>
• Former NBA star Dennis Rodman said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un didn't really "understand" President Donald Trump until he gave him a copy of the president's book, "The Art of the Deal," for his birthday in 2017.
• Rodman, who considers Kim a friend and has made a number of visits to North Korea, said he believes the North Korean leader has had "a change of heart" when it comes to both Trump and the American people.
• Trump is set to meet with Kim at some point in the near future to discuss North Korea's nuclear program, though a location and date have not yet been announced.

Former NBA star Dennis Rodman said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un didn't really "understand" President Donald Trump until he gave him a copy of the president's book, "The Art of the Deal," for his birthday in 2017.

In a recent interview with TMZ, Rodman said, "I think [Kim] didn't realize who Donald Trump was at that time, I guess, until he started to read the book and started to get to understand him."

Rodman, who considers Kim a friend and has made a number of visits to North Korea, said he believes the North Korean leader has had "a change of heart" when it comes to both Trump and the American people. The former NBA player didn't take full credit for this, but still feels his efforts at basketball diplomacy with North Korea played a significant role in the recent warming of relations.

"I don't want to take all the credit. I don't want to sit there and say, 'I did this, I did that.' That's not my intention," Rodman said. "My intention was to go over and be a sports ambassador to North Korea so people understand how the people are in North Korea. I think that has resonated to this whole point now."

Trump is set to meet with Kim at some point in the near future to discuss North Korea's nuclear program, though a location and date have not yet been announced. Rodman is seemingly very pleased with this development.

"I'm not the president. I'm just one person. I'm just one person and I'm so happy that things are going well," Rodman said.

In 2017 North Korea conducted a series of long-range missile tests as part of its broader ambition to develop a nuclear weapon capable of reaching the mainland US. This led to a war of words between Trump and Kim as well as harsh economic sanctions to be leveled against Pyongyang by the international community.

But the tide has turned in 2018 as North and South Korea have rekindled relations. Kim recently traveled to South Korea for a historic summit with President Moon Jae-in, in which the two leaders vowed to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula and work toward formally ending the Korean War.

Moon, as well as a number of Republican lawmakers back in the US, have given Trump a great deal of credit for these developments and have suggested the president should win the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in pressuring North Korea.</s>The White House said on Thursday it would welcome the release of three Americans imprisoned in North Korea as a goodwill gesture before a planned summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, but that it could not confirm reports that they are about to be freed. Expectations have grown that North Korea would soon release the three ahead of the unprecedented summit in the coming weeks. Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s new main lawyer, told Fox News Channel that Pyongyang would release them as early as Thursday. It was not immediately clear whether Giuliani had direct knowledge of negotiations around the issue. CNN, citing an unnamed source, said on Thursday the prisoners’ release was imminent, adding the groundwork for the move was laid two months ago when North Korea’s foreign minister traveled to Sweden and proposed the idea. “We can’t confirm the validity of any of the reports currently out about their release, but we certainly would see this as a sign of goodwill if North Korea were to release the three Americans ahead of discussions between President Trump and Kim Jong Un,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters.

The three are Korean-American missionary Kim Dong Chul, arrested in 2015; Kim Sang-duk, also known as Tony Kim, who spent a month teaching at the foreign-funded Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) before he was arrested in 2017; and Kim Hak Song, who also taught at PUST and was detained in 2017. Trump did not mention Korea or the prisoners when he spoke at a prayer event at the White House on Thursday. “Our country is doing very well. You’ll see some very good announcements very shortly,” he said. On Wednesday, Trump said on Twitter, “As everybody is aware, the past Administration has long been asking for three hostages to be released from a North Korean Labor camp, but to no avail. Stay tuned!” But of the three, only Kim Dong Chul was arrested before Trump became president in January 2017. The U.S. government is looking into reports that the Americans had recently been relocated from a labor camp to a hotel near Pyongyang, a U.S. official said on Wednesday.The summit between Trump and Kim is expected to take place in late May or early June.

In preparing for the summit, Trump’s administration has said it wants North Korea’s “complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization” but has offered few details of the strategy it will employ at the talks. Kim told the Chinese government’s top diplomat, State Councillor Wang Yi, on Thursday that he is committed to denuclearization, China’s foreign ministry said, as diplomatic efforts to bring lasting peace to the Korean peninsula gather pace. “Kim Jong Un said achieving the denuclearization of the peninsula is the firm position of the North Korean side,” China’s foreign ministry said after Wang met Kim in Pyongyang. North Korea announced on Sunday that it would close its main nuclear test site next month but some U.S. officials are skeptical that Pyongyang will give up its nuclear arsenal.

Trump has promised to ensure that North Korea does not get the capability to build a nuclear bomb that can hit the mainland United States. U.S. Vice President Mike Pence is postponing his plans to travel to Brazil this month in order to ensure foreign policy resources are focused on Trump’s talks with Kim, Pence’s spokeswoman said. The exact date and location has yet to be fixed for the meeting between Trump and Kim, who lobbed personal insults and lambasted each other last year over North Korea’s nuclear arms ambitions. The change in tone has been helped by last week’s meeting between Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, at which the two pledged to work for “complete denuclearization” of the Korean peninsula. Trump said he would maintain pressure on Pyongyang through sanctions ahead of his own meeting with Kim.

Even as Washington presses for the release of the three American prisoners, the parents of a U.S. college student who died last year soon after being release from captivity in North Korea have sued Pyongyang over their son’s death, saying Otto Warmbier was “brutally tortured and murdered.” Warmbier’s parents told a meeting at the United Nations on Thursday that they would no longer be silent and believed they had to stand up for their son and other families whose loved ones had been abducted by North Korea. “The only thing we can do is rub their noses in this. It embarrasses them,” said Cindy Warmbier, Otto’s mother. “You can’t negotiate. You just have to shame them.”</s>WASHINGTON — Vice-President Mike Pence is postponing a planned trip to Brazil this month as President Donald Trump prepares for a historic meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The vice-president had been expected to visit Brazil in late May. But his office says the trip is being postponed to avoid pulling national security resources away from Trump’s planned meeting with Kim.

Trump has not yet announced a date or location for the meeting. But he has said he favours holding the meeting at the Demilitarized Zone separating North and South Korea.

Pence’s office says by remaining in the U.S. the vice-president will be able to support the president and the national security team as the North Korean meeting approaches. Trump is pushing to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.</s>
• Former NBA star Dennis Rodman said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un didn't really "understand" President Donald Trump until he gave him a copy of the president's book, "The Art of the Deal," for his birthday in 2017.
• Rodman, who considers Kim a friend and has made a number of visits to North Korea, said he believes the North Korean leader has had "a change of heart" when it comes to both Trump and the American people.
• Trump is set to meet with Kim at some point in the near future to discuss North Korea's nuclear program, though a location and date have not yet been announced.

Former NBA star Dennis Rodman said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un didn't really "understand" President Donald Trump until he gave him a copy of the president's book, "The Art of the Deal," for his birthday in 2017.

In a recent interview with TMZ, Rodman said, "I think [Kim] didn't realize who Donald Trump was at that time, I guess, until he started to read the book and started to get to understand him."

Rodman, who considers Kim a friend and has made a number of visits to North Korea, said he believes the North Korean leader has had "a change of heart" when it comes to both Trump and the American people. The former NBA player didn't take full credit for this, but still feels his efforts at basketball diplomacy with North Korea played a significant role in the recent warming of relations.

"I don't want to take all the credit. I don't want to sit there and say, 'I did this, I did that.' That's not my intention," Rodman said. "My intention was to go over and be a sports ambassador to North Korea so people understand how the people are in North Korea. I think that has resonated to this whole point now."

Trump is set to meet with Kim at some point in the near future to discuss North Korea's nuclear program, though a location and date have not yet been announced. Rodman is seemingly very pleased with this development.

"I'm not the president. I'm just one person. I'm just one person and I'm so happy that things are going well," Rodman said.

In 2017 North Korea conducted a series of long-range missile tests as part of its broader ambition to develop a nuclear weapon capable of reaching the mainland US. This led to a war of words between Trump and Kim as well as harsh economic sanctions to be leveled against Pyongyang by the international community.

But the tide has turned in 2018 as North and South Korea have rekindled relations. Kim recently traveled to South Korea for a historic summit with President Moon Jae-in, in which the two leaders vowed to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula and work toward formally ending the Korean War.

Moon, as well as a number of Republican lawmakers back in the US, have given Trump a great deal of credit for these developments and have suggested the president should win the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in pressuring North Korea.</s>A top US Senator and member of the Democratic Party has lashed out against the idea of the US military’s hitting North Korea with a pre-emptive strike if upcoming talks between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un fail to produce significant results.

The option is believed to be widely favoured by Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton and other members of the president’s increasingly hawkish cabinet. Bolton declared in a Fox News interview last year that the only option left to address the North Korean nuclear challenge is “to end the regime in North Korea” and strike first.

But Edward Markey, the top Democrat on the Senate East Asia subcommittee, told an Atlantic Council event on Friday that “a failed Trump-Kim summit cannot become a stepping stone for a war, preventive or otherwise initiated by the United States”.

“Diplomacy backed by pressure is the only way to solve the North Korean nuclear crisis,” Markey said. “Should the talks collapse, however, a preventive strike still will not be justified.”

Notwithstanding current diplomatic efforts to achieve the removal of nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula, Trump has repeatedly said “all options are on the table” regarding the handling of North Korea, including what the administration refers to as a limited “bloody nose” strike.

Date and venue set for Trump-Kim summit ‘to be unveiled soon’

In January, the White House dropped plans to nominate Victor Cha, a former member of the National Security Council under President George W. Bush, for the Seoul ambassadorship because Cha expressed concern about going to the “bloody nose” option to deal with North Korea.

Bolton, who has warned in recent months that diplomatic efforts to quell North Korean aggression are futile, said in the Fox News interview that “anybody who thinks that more diplomacy with North Korea, more sanctions, whether against North Korea or an effort to apply sanctions against China, is just giving North Korea more time to increase its nuclear arsenal”.

Kim tries to mend fences with China ahead of Trump talks

“We have fooled around with North Korea for 25 years, and fooling around some more is just going to make matters worse.”

An impassioned Markey warned the “bloody nose” strategy could topple the region off a political “cliff”, with massive ramifications for the world.

“We need to avoid that outcome at all cost,” he said.

Trump said on Friday at the White House that “two or three” sites and “three or four” dates have been under consideration for his proposed meeting with Kim in May or early June.

That parley is to follow the historic inter-Korean meeting last week between the North Korean leader and South Korean President Moon Jae-in in the demilitarised zone.

Despite a lack of significant results coming from previous meetings in 2007 and 2000, the latest summit was seen as moving the Korean peninsula closer to peace, 65 years after the signing of the armistice that unofficially halted the hostilities.

Markey revealed that he told Trump directly at the White House in October that only a diplomatic resolution to the North Korea issue can prevent the issue from “turning down to catastrophic [consequences] quickly”.

The senator made the appeal to the US president after he led the first US Congressional delegation that visited Dandong, a border city in China connected to North Korea via a major railway bridge. North Korea, increasingly feeling the impact of years of United Nations and US economic sanctions, more than ever depends on China’s oil and food supply for survival.

The senator also urged the Trump administration to fill vacant diplomatic posts at the State Department ahead of the Trump-Kim summit.

Here’s why we shouldn’t believe Kim Jong-un’s promise to denuclearise

The State Department currently has at least four diplomatic jobs open related to North Korean affairs, including a special envoy for North Korean policy, an ambassador to Seoul, a sanctions coordinator and an envoy for North Korean human rights issues.

On top of those vacancies, the US Senate still has not confirmed Susan Thornton as the acting assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific affairs.

Without a fully staffed State Department, Markey said, the administration has fewer resources for building a diplomatic tool kit and fewer officials to hold North Korea accountable for its efforts to develop a nuclear arsenal capable of threatening the US.

“We cannot squander this opportunity [in the US-North Korea summit] by sidelining the expertise of those inside and outside of the government who have spent their careers trying to understand the nuances of nuclear negotiations of the Kim regime,” Markey said.

A Nobel Peace Prize for Trump is last thing the world needs

Although Trump has agreed to Kim’s proposal that they meet face-to-face – an unprecedented move that has raised hopes of a peaceful resolution to growing tensions on the Korean peninsula – wariness over the sincerity of Kim’s stated commitment to “denuclearisation” abounds.

The US has continued to maintain pressure on the regime, backing new sanctions on companies accused of doing business with Pyongyang. It also had joined South Korean troops in holding military exercises until a recess was called ahead of the upcoming Trump-Kim meeting.</s>Donald Trump is gearing up for an address to the National Rifle Association (NRA) as more than 70,000 members are expected in Texas for the group’s annual meeting.

Donald Trump is gearing up for an address to the National Rifle Association (NRA) as more than 70,000 members are expected in Texas for the group’s annual meeting.

He will speak at the event for the fourth year in a row. Last year, he became the first sitting president to appear in more than 30 years, declaring that the “assault” on the Second Amendment had ended. But this year’s speech in Dallas comes as the issue of gun violence takes on new urgency after one of the deadliest school shootings in US history.

Going to Dallas (the GREAT State of Texas) today. Leaving soon! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 4, 2018 Survivors of the February 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that left 17 people dead are leading a massive national gun control movement. Several groups have announced plans to protest over the weekend during the NRA event. The protesters will include parents of those killed in Parkland and other shootings.

The survivors’ campaign has not led to major changes from the White House or the Republican-led Congress but Mr Trump did briefly declare he would stand up to the powerful gun lobby. Donald Trump speaks during the NRA event last year in Atlanta (Mike Stewart/AP) He later backpedalled, expressing support for modest changes to the background check system, as well as arming teachers.

His attendance at this year’s NRA convention was announced just days ago and came after Vice President Mike Pence was already scheduled to appear. Asked why Mr Trump was attending, given political tensions around gun violence, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said this week that safety was a “big priority”.

One of the Parkland survivors, David Hogg, was critical of the president’s planned attendance. “It’s kind of hypocritical of him to go there after saying so many politicians bow to the NRA and are owned by them,” he said. “It proves that his heart and his wallet are in the same place.”

At a televised meeting with politicians in February, Mr Trump wagged his finger at a Republican senator and scolded him for being “afraid of the NRA”, declaring that he would stand up to the group and finally get results in quelling gun violence. NRA convention raffle items at the convention centre in Dallas (Sue Ogrocki/AP) He praised members of the gun lobby as “great patriots” but declared “that doesn’t mean we have to agree on everything”.

He said: “It doesn’t make sense that I have to wait until I’m 21 to get a handgun, but I can get this weapon at 18.” He was referring to the AR-15 the Parkland shooting suspect is accused of using. After expressing interest in increasing the minimum age to purchase a so-called assault weapon to 21, Mr Trump later declared there was “not much political support” for the move.

He then pushed off the issue of age restrictions by assigning the question to a commission. He ran as supposedly the best friend of the Second Amendment and has become gun grabber in chief
• “He ran as supposedly the best friend of the Second Amendment and has become gun grabber in chief” “He ran as supposedly the best friend of the Second Amendment and has become gun grabber in chief” Trump’s moves have drawn concerns from both sides of the gun debate.

“He ran as supposedly the best friend of the Second Amendment and has become gun grabber in chief,” said Michael Hammond, legislative counsel to the Gun Owners of America. He said his members were upset Mr Trump had approved a spending bill that included background check updates. “We’re not confident at all. We are very disappointed,” he said. Kristin Brown, of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said Mr Trump had offered mixed messages since the Parkland shooting.

“Which Donald Trump is going to show up?” she asked. “Will it be the one who sympathised with the Parkland students he brought to the White House, the one who met with members of the Senate … or the one who had burgers” with NRA head Wayne LaPierre.
Vice President of the United States Mike Pence postpones his trip to Brazil to focus foreign policy resources on Donald Trump's planned meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.