TOKYO/SEOUL - A top aide to North Korean
leader Kim Jong Un arrived in Singapore on Monday night,
Japanese public broadcaster NHK said on Tuesday, the latest
indication that the on-again-off-again summit with U.S.
President Donald Trump may go ahead.
Kim Chang Son, Kim's de facto chief of staff, flew to
Singapore via Beijing on Monday night, the report said.
At the same time, a team of U.S. government officials,
including the White House deputy chief of staff for operations
Joe Hagin, left U.S. Yokota Air Base in Japan for Singapore on
Monday, NHK said.
The White House said a "pre-advance" team was traveling to
Singapore to meet with North Koreans.
The reports indicate that planning for the historic summit,
initially scheduled for June 12, is moving ahead after Trump
called it off last week. A day later, Trump said he had
reconsidered, and officials from both countries were meeting to
work out details.
When Kim Chang Son was asked by a reporter at the Beijing
airport if he was flying to Singapore for talks with the United
States, he said he was "going there to play," according to
footage from Nippon Television Network.
Meanwhile, North Korea's Kim Yong Chol, a senior official
dealing with inter-Korean affairs was scheduled to fly to the
United States on Wednesday after speaking to Chinese officials
in Beijing, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said citing an
unnamed source.
Due to sanctions against him, Kim Yong Chol is banned from
visiting the United States normally. His visit to the United
States would indicate a waiver was granted.
The United States and South Korea blacklisted Kim Yong Chol
for supporting the North's nuclear and missile programmes in
2010 and 2016, respectively.
Yonhap added Choe Kang Il, a North Korean foreign ministry
official involved with North America issues, was also spotted at
Beijing Capital International Airport. Yonhap did not say
whether Choe would be accompanying Kim Yong Chol.
In a flurry of diplomacy over the weekend, Kim Jong Un and
South Korean President Moon Jae-in held a surprise meeting on
Saturday at the border village of Panmunjom, during which they
agreed the North Korea-U.S. summit must be held.
And on Sunday, the U.S. State Department said American and
North Korean officials had met at Panmunjom. Sung Kim, the
former U.S. ambassador to South Korea and current ambassador to
the Philippines, led that American delegation, an American
official told Reuters.
Moon said on Monday that there could be more impromptu talks
between the two Koreas in the lead-up to the summit.
In Kim and Moon's first, upbeat meeting on April 27, they
agreed to seek the "complete denuclearisation" of the Korean
peninsula - but didn't define what that meant, or how that would
proceed.
Since then, North Korea has rejected U.S. demands for it to
unilaterally abandon its nuclear weapons programme that experts
say could threaten the United States.
Pyongyang also demanded the United States halt future joint
military drills with South Korea if it truly wishes for talks
with North Korea, the North's Rodong Sinmun said on Tuesday.
In
response to reporters' questions regarding the report, South
Korea's defense ministry said it does not have plans to change
joint exercise schedules with the United States military.
Analysts believe Washington is trying to determine whether
North Korea is willing to agree on sufficient steps towards
denuclearisation to allow a summit to take place.
North Korea defends its nuclear and missile programmes as a
deterrent against perceived aggression by the United States,
which keeps 28,500 troops in South Korea, a legacy of the
1950-53 Korean War, which ended in a truce, not a peace treaty.
It has long said it is open to eventually giving up its
nuclear arsenal if the United States withdraws its troops from
South Korea and ends its “nuclear umbrella” alliance with Seoul.