North Korea nixes idea of more talks with US

North Korea dismissed the idea of any future nuclear negotiations with the U.S., saying Washington is using talks as a political tool without intending to accomplish anything.

“We do not feel any need to sit face-to-face with the U.S., as it does not consider the [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea]-U.S. dialogue as nothing more than a tool for grappling its political crisis,” North Korea Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui said Saturday, according to the official Korean Central News Agency. 

Pyongyang accused Washington of trying to fool North Korea, saying the Trump administration has “neither intention nor will to go back to the drawing board,” and warning that it will not change its nuclear policy.

“The U.S. is mistaken if it thinks things like negotiations would still work on us. We have already worked out detailed strategic timetable for putting under control the long-term threat from the U.S. There will never be any adjustment and change in our policy, conditional on external parameters like internal political schedule of someone,” said Choe. 

President Trump touted the prospect of a nuclear deal with North Korean strongman Kim Jong Un early in his administration, meeting with him three times and holding two historic nuclear summits. However, the prospects for a deal plummeted after negotiations collapsed in February 2019 over a logjam regarding sanctions on Pyongyang.

South Korea has tried in recent weeks to jumpstart talks between Washington and Pyongyang, urging that representatives from both governments meet ahead of the November presidential election as North Korea ramps up pressure on its southern neighbor. 

Improving ties on the Korean Peninsula began faltering last month after North Korea blew up an inter-Korean liaison office it shared with the South, blaming President Moon Jae-in for not living up to past promises he made to Kim, and threatened military action over anti-Pyongyang leaflets activists in the south had been floating across the border.