Pompeo arrives in North Korea

Says he seeks a more detailed commitment to denuclearisation from Pyongyang

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, second from right, greets Kim Yong Chol, second from left, North Korean senior ruling party official and former intelligence chief, as they arrive for a meeting at the Park Hwa Guest House in Pyongyang, North Korea, on Friday.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo arrived in Pyongyang on Friday to press Kim Jong-un for a more detailed commitment to denuclearisation following the North Korean leader’s historic summit with President Donald Trump.

Mr. Pompeo was greeted in the North Korean capital by Mr. Kim’s right hand man Kim Yong-chol and Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho.

Since meeting Mr. Kim in Singapore last month, Mr. Trump has been bullish about hopes for peace, boasting that the threat of nuclear war is over.

But the statement the leaders signed was short on clear commitments.

Mr. Kim agreed to the “complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula” — a stock phrase favoured by Pyongyang that stops short of longstanding U.S. demands for North Korea to give up its atomic arsenal in a “verifiable” and “irreversible” way. “Our leaders made commitments at the Singapore summit on the complete denuclearisation of North Korea,” Pompeo had earlier told reporters travelling with him.

Filling in details

“On this trip I’m seeking to fill in some details on those commitments and continue the momentum toward implementation of what the two leaders promised each other and the world,” he said. After a nearly three-hour meeting with Kim Yong-chol, the pair broke up for dinner, with the U.S. side saying that talks would continue Saturday morning.