Trump-Kim summit ends with promise, light on substance
US President Donald Trump made a stunning concession to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un yesterday about halting military exercises, pulling a surprise at a summit that baffled allies, military officials and lawmakers from his own Republican Party.
At a news conference after the historic meeting with Kim in Singapore, Trump announced he would halt what he called “very provocative” and expensive regular military exercises that the United States holds with South Korea.
That was sure to rattle close allies South Korea and Japan. North Korea has long sought an end to the war games.
The two leaders promised in a joint statement after their meeting to work toward the “denuclearisation” of the Korean Peninsula, and the United States promised its Cold War foe security guarantees. But they offered few specifics.
The summit, the first between a sitting US president and a North Korean leader, was in stark contrast to a flurry of North Korean nuclear and missile tests and angry exchanges of insults between Trump and Kim last year that fueled worries about war.
“We will be stopping the war games which will save us a tremendous amount of money, unless and until we see the future negotiation is not going along like it should. But we’ll be saving a tremendous amount of money, plus I think it’s very provocative,” Trump said. His announcement was a surprise even to President Moon.
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