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On June 30, 2019, US President Donald Trump stands with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Panmunjom. (AP/Yonhap)

With about a month to go before the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Gyeongju, there is mounting speculation about a US-North Korea summit taking place on the sidelines of the forum, scheduled for late October. 

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly indicated that he's willing to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, and Kim has made reference to a "good memory" of his interactions with Trump. Such comments are fueling expectations surrounding a potential summit. The question is how to deal with Kim's precondition for negotiations: international recognition as a nuclear state.

Speaking to reporters in New York on Friday, a high-ranking government official noted that while it was difficult to say for certain whether the APEC forum could lead to a summit between the North Korean and US leaders, the possibility “couldn’t be ruled out.”

“It may very well happen, and we will continue to monitor the situation while hoping that it does,” the official said. 

Foreign Minister Cho Hyun expressed his anticipation of a possible meeting between Kim and Trump during an interview with the Associated Press published Saturday, remarking, “It would be fantastic if they met with each other in the near future.” 

The Lee administration believes that a North Korea-US summit could prime the pump for inter-Korean dialogue. 

The problem lies in the fact that North Korea has made it clear that it will only engage in dialogue on the condition that the US and others acknowledge it as a nuclear state. 

The KCNA, North Korea’s state-run media, reported Saturday that Kim met scientists and technicians in the nuclear weapons field and repeated the “invariable stand” of North Korea, which keeps “the logic of peacekeeping and security by force with nuclear forces as its backbone.”
 
In effect, Kim reiterated that North Korea is unwilling to part ways with its nuclear weapons after both South Korea and the US brought up denuclearization despite Pyongyang sending the message that dialogue with the US is contingent on its recognition as a nuclear state.  

During a speech before North Korea’s legislature on Sept. 21, Kim said, “Personally, I still have a good memory of the current US President Trump,” while suggesting that North Korea had no reason not to “come face to face with” the US if Washington abandoned the “absurd pursuit” of denuclearization and sought “genuine peaceful coexistence” with Pyongyang. 

Yet given Trump’s unconventional approach to diplomacy, there’s no ruling out a surprise sit-down between him and Kim like the one seen in 2019. After wrapping up a Group of 20 summit in Japan on June 29 of that year, Trump sent a tweet proposing that he meet Kim at the DMZ “just to shake his hand and say Hello,” which led to a full-on North Korea-US summit at Panmunjom. It was on this occasion that Trump became the first sitting US president to set foot in North Korea. 

Experts suggest that recent trips to China by high-ranking North Korean officials are worth paying close attention to.  

“Following Kim Jong-un’s trip to China, North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui also secured a one-on-one meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi,” noted Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies. “Ahead of past North Korea-US talks, either Kim Jong-un himself or other high-ranking North Korean officials have paid visits to China to explain the situation. That precedent suggests that they may be eyeing a summit with the US.” 

Choe is currently in Beijing for a four-day trip after arriving on Saturday, following a visit to the Chinese capital by Kim Jong-un earlier this month to take part in China’s Victory Day celebrations. 

Yang suggested that there “won’t be any progress” if we think of North Korea’s insistence that it has nuclear weapons and the South Korean and US’ insistence on denuclearization as being mutually exclusive. 

“President Lee Jae Myung just put forward his three-stage proposal for denuclearization. It’s bound to take time to reach dismantlement, so they could reach an agreement to take the first step of ‘stopping’ [advancements in nuclear technology], while agreeing to make denuclearization the end goal,” Yang said. 

On his first day back in office, Trump raised eyebrows by referring to North Korea as a “nuclear power.”

By Seo Young-ji, staff reporter

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