PYONGYANG — At 3:45 p.m. local time on Sunday, history was made as President Donald Trump became the first sitting US President to step foot in North Korea. Both Trump and Marshal Kim Jung Un stepped over the demarcation line at the northern edge of infamous Demilitarized Zone or ‘DMZ’ which divides North and South Korea. The pair shook hands after Kim invited Trump to cross into his country on foot.
According to reports from the Washington Post, the two leaders met for 53 minutes of private talks before agreeing to set up respective teams to “work out some details” for a new round of bilateral negotiations over North Korea’s nuclear program, and the future security arrangements for the Korean Peninsula.
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Trump remarked afterwards:
“Speed is not the object, we want to see if we can do a really comprehensive, good deal.”
“Nobody knows how things turn out, but certainly this was a great day, this was a very legendary, very historic day.”
“It’ll be even more historic if something comes up, something very important,” he added. “Very big stuff, pretty complicated, but not as complicated as people think.”
Their historic meeting was said to have only been arranged only 48 hours beforehand. Relations between the two governments had been tenuous for the last four months after the breakdown of their second summit in Hanoi, but Trump still maintained that the Hanoi summit was a success and had in fact furthered his relationship with the North Korean leader.
The current peace process was spurred on by an unlikely catalyst, former NBA basketball star Dennis Rodman, who is credited with initiating a line of communication between Kim and Trump in 2017.
Wishing my friends, @realDonaldTrump and Marshal Kim Jong Un a very good meeting… Much love to you both and keep up the wonderful progress! #PEACEANDLOVE
— Dennis Rodman (@dennisrodman) June 30, 2019
However, the US and North Korea still remain heavily divided over Washington’s proposed path the ‘denuclearization’ of the Korean peninsula, with the US insisting the punitive economic sanction remain in place until Pyongyang dismantles all of its nuclear weapons capabilities.
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