White House Says North Korea Meeting Will Happen Only With 'Concrete' Action

The White House appeared Friday to put conditions on a much anticipated meeting between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, with press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders saying it would only happen once the rogue nation takes "concrete and verifiable action" to demonstrate its commitment to denuclearization. South Korea’s national security adviser, Chung Eui-yong, said at the White House on Thursday that Trump had agreed to “meet Kim Jong Un by May to achieve permanent denuclearization.”

Sanders said that neither a date nor a location had been determined for a meeting, to which Trump seems to have already committed. Sanders said Trump would take the meeting only “on the basis that we have concrete and verifiable steps” toward the denuclearization of North Korea. Tillerson has made this assertion frequently in recent months as he traveled the world seeking to enlist nations in the administration's "maximum pressure" campaign of sanctions against Pyongyang over its nuclear and missile programs. South Korea said the president agreed to meet Kim by May, but Sanders said Friday that no time and place had been set -- a refrain Trump repeated in a Friday night tweet. A personal meeting was all but unthinkable while Trump was being dismissed as a "senile dotard" and the North Korean "rocket man" was snapping off weapons tests in his quest for a nuclear arsenal that could threaten the U.S. mainland. Hours before the announcement, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had declared that the U.S. is "a long ways from negotiations" with North Korea. Meanwhile Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, speaking to reporters traveling with him on a trip to Africa, said talks between Trump and Kim should happen within weeks. "But, at the end of the day, the ultimate person to lead that negotiation or that conversation and be at the table will be the president."
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders says that the White House needs to see "concrete and verifiable steps" toward the denuclearization of North Korea before meeting with Kim Jong-un.