He cited a formal end to the 1950-53 Korean War establishing diplomatic missions in each country and economic development for North Korea. I think there are things that could be done in a relatively short period." "I don't think it has to be a long, drawn-out process. I think Kim Jong Un has made a strategic decision to pursue talks," said DeTrani, the former CIA officer. So what are the prospects of a breakthrough with North Korea? Trump pulled out of the deal in May, though the other parties involved remain committed to the agreement for now. Iran reached a nuclear deal with world powers in 2015. Many details were collected by international inspectors, who haven't been allowed inside North Korea in years. knew much more about Iran's nuclear program when those negotiations took place. "I think we have to recognize the uncertainties."īy comparison, the U.S. There have been press reports that the intelligence community is talking about 30 to 60," he added. "Some of the key experts are talking about somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 to 40 nuclear weapons. We don't know," said Bennett, who has traveled to South Korea more than 100 times and closely follows North Korea.Īnd how many nuclear weapons does North Korea have? "The key question on nuclear weapons is how many uranium enrichment facilities have they had. The Two-Way Pompeo Meets With Top North Korean Official In Hopes Of Reviving Singapore Summit That's why you pay us."īruce Bennett of the Rand Corporation said important information about the North's nuclear program remains fuzzy. But it's completely inadequate for the CIA to say, 'Well, that's a hard problem.' Of course it's a hard problem. "We are still suffering from having gaps," Pompeo acknowledged in his speech back in January. He has organized all three meetings between South Korean and North Korean leaders - in 20, as well as the most recent one in April. On the South Korean side as well, the point man for the summit is the country's national intelligence chief, Suh Hoon. Pompeo said Kim Jong Chol will deliver a letter from Kim Jong Un to Trump. Pompeo and Kim Jong Chol plan to meet again in Washington on Friday. He's a former intelligence chief himself, and is considered the right-hand man of Kim Jong Un. Yet Pompeo and Andrew Kim were together again in New York at a dinner on Wednesday night and in talks Thursday with North Korea's Kim Yong Chol. To be clear, the State Department is deeply involved in the current summit preparations. So even though we don't have diplomatic relations we still have the ability to have those kinds of channels," she added. "The State Department has been in the lead for those negotiations. "The policy process should not be being driven by the intelligence community," said Rosenberger, now a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, in Washington. She even visited a North Korean nuclear site a decade ago during an earlier moment of diplomatic optimism. She worked on North Korean issues at the National Security Council and at the State Department. Laura Rosenberger has some reservations about the prominence of intelligence officials in these negotiations. In the photo of that Pompeo-Kim meeting on May 9, the lone American sitting next to Pompeo is the CIA's Andrew Kim. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and CIA official Andrew Kim, both at right, meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on May 9 in the capital Pyongyang.Īfter Pompeo became secretary of state a month ago, he made a second trip to see Kim Jong Un in North Korea. and Korean spy chiefs are playing an unusually prominent role when it comes to the summit. The CIA is often involved behind the scenes in the run-up to a presidential summit. If the summit happens, it would be the first meeting between leaders of the two countries. President Trump was clearly impressed with Pompeo's initiative on North Korea, and sent him there - reportedly with Andrew Kim - on a secret trip in April to lay the groundwork for the possible summit between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. He didn't name that senior leader, but was referring to Andrew Kim, a Korean-American who grew up in South Korea. "Within weeks of me coming here, I created a Korea Mission Center, stood it up with a senior leader who had just retired, brought him back to run the organization," Pompeo said in January. When Mike Pompeo became CIA director last year, he immediately set his sights on North Korea and its opaque nuclear program. Current and former spy chiefs are playing an unusually prominent role in arranging a proposed summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the former CIA director, and CIA official Andrew Kim, the pair on the left, have dinner with North Korea's Kim Yong Chol, a former intelligence chief, in New York on Wednesday.
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