Daily Times

North and South Korea’s leaders held surprise talks on Saturday to get a historic summit between Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump back on track after a head-spinning series of twists and turns.

The meeting is the latest remarkable diplomatic chapter in a roller coaster of developments on the Korean peninsula.

Trump had rattled the region on Thursday by cancelling his meeting with Kim which had been due to take place in Singapore on June 12 citing “open hostility” from Pyongyang.

But within 24 hours he reversed course saying it could still go ahead after productive talks were held with North Korean officials.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in met with Kim Saturday in an effort to ensure the landmark meeting between Trump and the North Korean leader goes ahead.

“They exchanged views and discussed ways to implement the Panmunjom Declaration and to ensure a successful US North Korea summit,” Seoul’s presidential Blue House said in a statement, adding Moon would make a personal statement on Sunday morning.

The leaders held talks for two hours in the same Panmunjom truce village where they had met last month, making a declaration vowing to improve ties.

Pictures showed them shaking hands and embracing on the North Korean side of the Demilitarised Zone separating the two nations.

Remarkable detente

Trump’s original decision to abandon the historic summit blindsided South Korea which had been brokering a remarkable detente between Washington and Pyongyang.

Last year Trump and Kim were threatening war after Pyongyang tested its most powerful nuclear bomb to date and launched test missiles it said were capable of reaching the United States.

Tensions were calmed after Kim extended an olive branch to Seoul by offering to send a delegation to the Winter Olympics in South Korea, sparking a sudden detente that led to Trump agreeing to hold direct talks with Pyongyang.

Moon, a longtime advocate of engagement with the North, won election last year partly by vowing to be open to dialogue with Pyongyang and finding a solution to a Cold War-era sore that continues to blight the region.

But the flurry of diplomatic backslapping and bonhomie disappeared in recent weeks as the summit was thrown into doubt by increasingly bellicose rhetoric from both top US administration officials and Pyongyang.

Trump eventually pulled the plug on talks in a personal letter to Kim on Thursday.

Published in Daily Times, May 27^th 2018.