WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 19th April, 2019) The United States stands ready to engage North Korea despite media reports that Pyongyang called on the Trump administration to remove US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo from any nuclear-related talks going forward, a State Department official told Sputnik on Thursday.
Earlier in the day, North Korean state-run news agency KCNA reported that a senior official from the country's Foreign Ministry, Kwon Jong Gun, called on the United States to replace Pompeo with a more careful and mature negotiator. Kwon blamed Pompeo for the failure of the second summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in February, the report said.
"We are aware of the report. The United States remains ready to engage North Korea in a constructive negotiation," the official said when asked about Pyongyang's reported demand.
According to KCNA, Kwon said Kim and Trump have continued to enjoy good relations despite the failure of their most recent denuclearization talks in Hanoi.
At their first historic summit in Singapore last June Trump and Kim agreed that North Korea would make efforts toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in exchange for freezing of US-South Korean military exercises and gradual removal of sanctions.
While an agreement was expected to be signed at the second summit in Hanoi in late February, Trump walked away from the talks given that Kim demanded full removal of sanctions on North Korea without pledging to denuclearize the sites that the United States had specified.
