U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has rejected charges from North Korea’s Foreign Ministry that plans for a joint South Korea-U.S. military exercise are in breach of agreements between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
The North on Tuesday said Trump reaffirmed in a meeting with Kim last month that joint exercises would be halted, and that the planned exercise was “clearly a breach” of the two leaders’ agreement in their Singapore summit last year.
Pompeo was asked about the North Korean statements in an interview on Wednesday with the EWTN Catholic television network.
He said the U.S. was doing exactly what President Trump promised Chairman Kim it would do with respect to those exercises.
Asked if stalled talks with North Korea would restart soon, Pompeo said he hopes so, adding that Chairman Kim made a commitment that they would.
He said that in several weeks he would put his working-level team back together and they are "ready to go.”
Pompeo stressed that substantial progress must be made in working-level talks ahead of a possible third Trump-Kim summit.
After meeting with the North Korean leader at the inter-Korean border on June 30th, Trump announced they agreed to resume working-level talks in two to three weeks, but this has yet to happen.
Criticizing the South Korea-U.S. exercise slated for next month, North Korea said it was putting nuclear talks with the U.S. at risk.