DPRK unhappy with Pompeo talks
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Democratic People’s Republic of Korea said yesterday it no longer wanted to deal with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and said he should be replaced in talks by someone “more mature,” hours after it announced its first weapons test since nuclear talks broke down.
DPRK’s official KCNA news agency quoted senior foreign ministry official Kwon Jong Gun as warning that no one could predict the situation on the Korean Peninsula if the United States did not abandon the “root cause” that compelled DPRK to develop nuclear weapons.
The statement came shortly after DPRK announced that leader Kim Jong Un had overseen the testing of a new tactical guided weapon, which KCNA said has a “peculiar mode of guiding flight” and “a powerful warhead.”
It was DPRK’s first weapon test since talks in Vietnam between Kim and US President Donald Trump in late February broke down over conflicting demands by DPRK for sanctions relief and by the US for DPRK to abandon its nuclear program. KCNA gave no details on the weapon that was tested yesterday.
KCNA quoted Kwon, who is in charge of US affairs, as saying the Vietnam summit showed that talks could go wrong “whenever Pompeo pokes his nose in.”
“I am afraid that, if Pompeo engages in the talks again, the table will be lousy once again and the talks will become entangled,” Kwon said. “Therefore, even in the case of a possible resumption of the dialogue with the US, I wish our dialogue counterpart would be not Pompeo but other people who is more careful and mature in communicating with us.”
Although Kwon did not explain in details on why DPRK felt compelled to develop nuclear weapons, it has long spoken of the need to defend itself from what it sees as US aggression.
The US State Department said yesterday it was still ready to negotiate with DPRK after the regime called for Pompeo to be excluded from future nuclear talks.
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