President Donald Trump has hastily cut short his two-day summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi, ending the talks early and leaving empty handed as he prepares to return to Washington and a tsunami of scrutiny over Michael’s Cohen’s testimony to Congress.
In a press conference in the Vietnamese capital, Trump downplayed the summit setback, calling the meeting “productive.”
Trump said the talks broke down over Kim’s demand that the United States lift all sanctions on North Korea.
“They wanted the sanctions lifted in entirety, and we couldn’t do that,” the president said. “We had to walk away from that.”
Trump suggested that Kim had been willing to completely dismantle the Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center in exchange for sanctions being lifted. However, that ultimately wasn’t satisfactory to the Americans because North Korea has other nuclear weapons and missile facilities.
“I could have done a deal today,” Trump repeated multiple times.
Prior to Trump’s trip, the White House tried to tamp down expectations for the second summit with the reclusive dictator. However, Trump said in Hanoi that he and Kim have a “great relationship.”
Before talks ended on Thursday, Kim took the rare step of answering a question from a foreign journalist, saying, “It’s too early to tell, but I wouldn’t say I’m pessimistic. For what I feel right now, I do have a feeling that good results will come out.”
Trump landed in Hanoi early this week eager for a victory as drama was unfolding in Washington over reports that Special Counsel Robert Mueller is preparing to issue his final report. On Wednesday, in the middle of the night Vietnam time, the President’s former lawyer Michael Cohen derided his former boss as a “racist” and a “conman” live on national television during his five-hour testimony before Congress.
Republican lawmakers sought to discredit the disgraced attorney, who pleaded guilty in August to tax evasion, campaign finance violations and making false financial statements.
Asked about Cohen’s testimony, Trump said he tried to watch it from Vietnam. “I didn’t watch too much because I’ve been busy,” Trump said.
Trump called Cohen’s claims “incorrect” and said he was a liar, but did not directly address the allegations he raised in his testimony.
However, Trump conceded, “He didn’t lie about one thing, he said no collusion.”
On the other side of the world, North Koreans awoke Thursday to state-owned newspapers splashed with color photographs of Trump and Kim smiling and shaking hands before their nations’ flags. In Vietnam, the front page of an English-language newspaper read: “Give Peace a Chance.”
Trump and Kim’s two-day summit was the second such meeting after their historic handshake in Singapore last June made them the first sitting leaders of the U.S. and North Korea ever to meet face to face. The encounter culminated with a vague document that raised more questions than it answered about how and when Kim would eliminate his nuclear arsenal and what the U.S. promised in return.
In Hanoi, Trump and Kim were widely expected to sign a declaration of peace on the peninsula, a symbolic gesture that would have paved the way toward a formal treaty to end the Korean War. The 1950-53 conflict ended with an armistice, not an accord, and the bitterly divided peninsula has since lived under a fragile truce protected by a U.S.-led U.N. Command of troops stationed mostly in South Korea and Japan.
