“The vice president was ready to take this opportunity to drive home the necessity of North Korea abandoning its illicit ballistic missile and nuclear programs,” Ms. Nauert said on Tuesday. But even if there are now no preconditions for talks, the Trump administration still insists that North Korea will not be rewarded for just opening a dialogue. While Mr. Pence and Ms. Kim were in South Korea, Mr. Moon’s government publicly called for dialogue between Washington and Pyongyang. Moon to visit North Korea for a summit meeting. performance in South Korea last week,” said Lee Sung-yoon, a Korea expert at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.

Source: New York Times February 21, 2018 04:45 UTC