U.S. Secretary of State-designate Mike Pompeo has expressed optimism that the Trump administration will come up with conditions for a peaceful solution to the North Korean nuclear issue.

Pompeo on Thursday presented his assessments regarding the upcoming U.S.-North Korea summit during his confirmation hearing in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. 

The chief of the Central Intelligence Agency(CIA) told the senators that “no one is under any illusions” that the summit will achieve a comprehensive agreement on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

However, Pompeo said that he’s optimistic that the meeting could “set us down the course to achieve a diplomatic outcome that America and the world so desperately need.”

The nominee, who is known for his hawkish approach to U.S. security, denied that he had ever advocated for a regime change in North Korea. 

Pompeo said at the Aspen Institute last July that the U.S. administration’s priority is to separate Kim Jong-un from the nuclear weapons he controls.

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