Reuters/Jonathan Ernst
President Donald Trump at the White House earlier this month.
- President Donald Trump pulled a classic North Korean negotiating move by canceling his planned summit with Kim Jong Un on Thursday.
- Within 12 hours of Trump's cancellation, North Korea backtracked on previous threats to "reconsider" the summit.
- It now says it will meet Trump "at any time" should he reconsider, and Trump has also left the door open for future talks.
- Trump has shown he's not desperate to talk to Kim at any cost, and it changed North Korea's tune.
President Donald Trump took a page out of North Korea's book by canceling his planned summit with Kim Jong Un on Thursday, and now Pyongyang appears to be scrambling to save the summit.
Within 12 hours of Trump's cancellation, which he said was down to North Korean hostility, Pyongyang backtracked on previous threats to "reconsider" the summit.
It instead insisted "we have the intent to sit with the U.S. side to solve problem regardless of ways at any time."
Trump said North Korea's recent "tremendous anger and open hostility" towards the US made the summit inappropriate. Media from Pyongyang had been bashing senior Trump administration officials and even threatening nuclear war.
But North Korea on Friday seemed to sweep that under the rug, saying the hostility "is just a reaction to the unbridled remarks made by the U.S. side which has long pressed the DPRK unilaterally to scrap nuclear program ahead of the DPRK-U.S. summit."
North and South Korea, in the Panmunjom Declaration made when Kim met South Korean President Moon Jae-in, have stressed a phased approach to denuclearization. The US reportedly favors a front-loaded agreement that would see North Korea abandon its weapons up front.
Present in North Korea's response was a sense of looking back in regret. The statement said North Korea "inwardly highly appreciated President Trump" for accepting the summit, and praised him for the move.
"We even inwardly hoped that what is called 'Trump formula.' would help clear both sides of their worries and comply with the requirements of our side and would be a wise way of substantial effect for settling the issue," the statement continued, in a possible attempt at flattering Trump.
A page from North Korea's book
South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, left, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il toast each other at a luncheon June 15, 2000 held in Pyongyang.
North Korea is no stranger to talks with the US. The past four US presidents have all attempted diplomacy with Pyongyang, and all failed.
Typically, these talks end with North Korea walking away or taking provocative actions that force the US to walk away.
North Korea frequently cites "hostile" US policy as motivation to develop weapons and resist diplomatic solutions. Now, Trump has done that to North Korea.
As the summit approached, it became clear that North Korea had its own ideas of denuclearization, and that they didn't match those of the US.
South Korea "overestimated what the North means in terms of denuclearisation and oversold it to Washington," Chun Yung-woo, a former South Korean nuclear negotiator, told Reuters.
But Trump reportedly sensed the disappointment hiding around the corner, and beat the North Koreans to the punch by exiting the summit so quickly he told neither South Korea or Congress beforehand.
The door is still open
Ahn Young-joon/AP
A composite image of Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un
Above all, North Korea's statement on Friday left the door open to future talks. Trump, in his letter to Kim Jong Un, did the same.
"Please do not hesitate to call or write" Trump wrote in the conclusion of his letter.
"This looks more like a deferral than a cancellation. The tone of Trump's letter is civil and diplomatic. There are lots of doors left open," Robert Manning, senior fellow in the Atlantic Council's Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security wrote of the letter.
But for now, Trump has shown that he's not so desperate to talk to Kim that he'll enter the talks from a weakened position, and with a single letter, he's changed North Korea's tune.