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North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Son-gwon (pool photo)

One day after Kim Yo-jong, younger sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, rejected the idea of dialogue with the US, North Korea’s foreign minister reiterated that stance, stating that North Korea is “not considering even the possibility of any contact with the US.”

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the DPRK [North Korea] welcomes the clear-cut press statement issued by [Kim Yo-jong] the vice department director of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea, which is to brush off hasty judgment, conjecture and expectation of the US. We are not considering even the possibility of any contact with the US, let alone having it, which would get us nowhere, only taking up precious time,” said Foreign Minister Ri Son-gwon in a statement published by the Korean Central News Agency on Wednesday.

After White House national security advisor Jake Sullivan said that Kim Jong-un’s remark about being “prepared for both dialogue and confrontation” during the 3rd Plenary Session of the 8th Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea was an “interesting signal,” Kim Yo-jong responded that the Biden administration’s expectations could “plunge them into greater disappointment.”

Nevertheless, Ri appeared to tone down his language, avoiding expressions of hostility toward the US.

Paradoxically, North Korea’s declaration of its unwillingness to hold talks with the US for two days in a row could be interpreted as underlining that the US needs to create conditions and incentives for the North to engage in dialogue.

South Korea and the US decided Tuesday to terminate the working group that has been criticized for hobbling the development of inter-Korean relations, but they haven’t offered concrete and practical incentives that could convince the North to agree to resume dialogue.

Since the breakdown of North Korea-US dialogue in Hanoi at the end of February 2019, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has also said that the precondition for resuming dialogue is the US retracting its “policy of hostility.” But the US and South Korea haven’t offered concrete plans about halting their joint military exercises, which the North regards as a key component of that policy.

Since North Korea has reiterated that it won’t hold talks with the US in the current situation, the method and scale of the joint exercise scheduled for August are likely to be the key variable setting the tone for Korean Peninsula affairs in the second half of the year.

By Gil Yun-hyung, staff reporter

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