North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un (L) shakes hands with US President Donald Trump (R) after taking part in a signing ceremony at the end of their historic US-North Korea summit, at the Capella Hotel on Sentosa island in Singapore on June 12, 2018. North Korea leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump exchanged signed documents at the Capella resort on Sentosa Island Tuesday, June 12, 2018 in Singapore. Singapore summit: How did we get here? North Korea leader Kim Jong Un (L) and US President Donald Trump shake hands after their meetings at the Capella resort on Sentosa Island in Singapore on June 12, 2018. North Korea leader Kim Jong Un (L) and US President Donald Trump shake hands after their meetings at the Capella resort on Sentosa Island in Singapore on June 12, 2018. (CNN) — US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said there will be no sanctions relief for North Korea while it maintains nuclear weapons, contradicting North Korean state media who said it could take place “as progress is made.” Pompeo made the statement during a news conference with the South Korean and Japanese foreign ministers in Seoul Thursday, 24 hours after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un touched down in Pyongyang, triumphant after his meeting with US President Donald Trump. North Korean state media KCNA reported Wednesday that Trump had discussed lifting sanctions against Pyongyang during his talks with Kim in Singapore. “The President of the US expressed the possibility of suspending the US - South Korea joint military exercises … and, as progress is made from dialogue and negotiations, lifting sanctions against DPRK,” state media said. Today's Rodong Sinmun is out. When North Koreans get their newspapers, they will see this large photo of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walking away from an Air China jet having returned home from Singapore.. Headline describes the summit as success and announces Kim's return. pic.twitter.com/gypic2HRXY — Peter Ward, 워드 피터，皮得 (@rpcward89) June 13, 2018 But Pompeo said Thursday that Trump had been very clear there would only be sanctions relief after “complete denuclearization.” “He has said this from the very beginning, he said it again to Chairman Kim and he said it in his press conference following his meeting with Chairman Kim,” he told reporters. Pompeo is on a tour of East Asia visiting with US allies and diplomatic partners to brief them on Trump’s talks. From South Korea, he’ll fly to China for meetings with top officials in Beijing later Thursday. 02:35 - Source: CNN S. Korea security adviser: not up to Trump to end drills Canceling drills requires ‘consultations’: South Korea The Trump administration is expected to announce as soon as Thursday the formal suspension of planning for major multilateral military drills in August, US officials told CNN. Trump made the surprise announcement that military drills would be called off during a news conference after his summit with Kim on Tuesday. However speaking opposite Secretary Pompeo on Thursday, South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said decisions to suspend the exercises would “require consultations.” “This is an issue that involves the Korea-US alliance and this requires consultations between the military authorities of the two countries the Korea and the United States and it will be the case in the future as well,” she told reporters. 01:21 - Source: CNN Trump: We will stop 'war games' It echoed comments made after Trump’s Tuesday announcement, when South Korea’s presidential office said they needed “to figure out president Trump’s accurate meaning and intention.” Pompeo also met with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Thursday, who again described the Trump-Kim summit as “very successful.” “There are various opinions about the meeting, but the most important thing is that the talks have made it possible for people around the world, including the people of the US, SK and Japan, to escape the threats of war, nuclear threats and the threats of long range missiles,” Moon said in a statement. Xi pushed Trump to suspend drills, source says Following his talks with Japan and South Korea, Pompeo will head to Beijing to brief the Chinese government on Trump’s meeting with Kim. He’s due to meet with Foreign Minister Wang Yi before talks with President Xi Jinping at 9 p.m. local time (9 a.m. ET). A source familiar with the matter told CNN the idea to suspend military exercises with South Korea had been heavily pushed by President Xi in the lead up to the Singapore summit. The source added Xi had multiple direct conversations with Trump about the topic before the US President met with Kim. Experts said the decision to postpone the drills was a win for Beijing, who have long sought a way to drive a wedge between the US and its East Asian allies. Currently there are around 28,000 American troops in South Korea, as well as another 49,000 in Japan. “If they end these exercises then people in South Korea will begin to question why are US troops even there?” Bonnie Glaser, director of the China Power Project at CSIS, told CNN. But both the Japanese and South Korean foreign ministers were firm in their statements on Thursday that the US alliance was strong and US troops were there to stay. “Secretary Pompeo and I reaffirm that the South Korean US alliance … is robust as ever, that the US forces in Korea has played and will continue to play a crucial role for deterrence and peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula,” Kang said. CNN’s Jake Kwon contributed to this article.<doc-sep>U.S. President Donald Trump walks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at the Capella Hotel on Sentosa island in Singapore in this picture released on June 12, 2018 by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency. KCNA via REUTERS SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean state media said on Wednesday U.S. President Donald Trump had agreed to lift sanctions against the North in addition to providing security guarantees in the summit with the North’s leader, Kim Jong Un, the previous day. Trump was cited by North Korea’s official KCNA news agency as saying he made the promise after pledging to end joint military exercises with South Korea. There was no immediate comment about sanctions from the U.S. side.<doc-sep>Mr Trump had said after his meeting with the North Korean leader that sanctions - which place stringent restrictions on how North Korea can interact with the outside world - would remain in effect until "the nukes are no longer a factor", but it was unclear exactly what that meant.<doc-sep>
​A North Korean state-run media outlet on Wednesday claimed President Trump offered to lift sanctions against the regime — a claim that goes against the president’s comments after his historic summit with Kim Jong Un. The Korean Central News Agency listed a number of concessions that Trump made to Kim in Singapore, including a halt to joint military operations with South Korea, a vow to provide security guarantees and to “lift sanctions against it along with advance in improving the mutual relationship through dialogue and negotiation.” The KCNA report, published after Kim returned home, misrepresented remarks Trump made at a news conference after the summit when he said the sanctions will remain in place and credited the penalties with bringing North Korea to the negotiating table. ​”​The sanctions will come off when we are sure that the nukes are no longer a factor​,” the president told reporters Tuesday. “Sanctions played a big role, but they’ll come off at that point. I hope it’s going to be soon, but they’ll come off. As you know, and as I’ve said, the sanctions right now remain.​”​ ​KCNA also said both leaders “gladly accepted” each other’s invitation to visit their countries. It reported that Kim told Trump that it was “urgent” that the two countries halt “irritating and hostile military actions against each other” during the talks.​ Trump at the news conference suddenly announced that he would end “provocative” and “expensive” joint military operations between the US and South Korea, declaring, “I think it’s inappropriate to have war games” while negotiations were under way. The media outlet also said the two leaders agreed to follow a “step-by-step” process in future talks. ​​“Kim Jong Un and Trump had the shared recognition to the effect that it is important to abide by the principle of step-by-step and simultaneous action in achieving peace, stability and denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” ​KCNA said. ​In a tweet Trump posted after landing in Washington, he called the talks with Kim “positive.”​ ​”​Just landed – a long trip, but everybody can now feel much safer than the day I took office​,” he wrote on his Twitter account. “There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea. Meeting with Kim Jong Un was an interesting and very positive experience. North Korea has great potential for the future!​”​ ​​Kim’s ruling party’s ​newspaper, the Rodong Sinmun, called the sitdown “the meeting of the century” on its front page Wednesday. It devoted half of its six pages to the meeting and splashed 33 photos of Kim and Trump ​shaking hands, attending a working lunch and sitting down to sign the agreement to denuclearize on the cover and on the inside pages. T​he KCNA report was also read on state television by Ri Chun Hee, a 75-year-old grandmother who usually announces major news — including North Korea’s largest nuclear test last September. She also went on air to report on the deaths of Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung, Kim Jong Un’s father and grandfather. KCNA reported that after lunch, Kim and Trump walked together, “deepening friendly feelings,” and posed for a “meaningful photo session” to mark the signing of the agreement.