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THE NEW: China and US diplomacy AND trade war

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The Trump-Kim 'Historic' Encounter "

The Trump-Kim 'Historic' Encounter " The joint statement of United States(US) President Donald Trump and North Korean Chairman Kim Jong-un at their Singapore Summit on 12 June 2018 characterises the meeting as “historic,” as has the media, repeatedly. But considering that this was the first face-to-face encounter between a US president and a North Korean top leader, the laconic joint statement issued at the end of it left a lot of questions unanswered. The essence of the statement was that Trump committed to provide “security guarantees” to North Korea, and Kim “reaffirmed” his responsibility to “complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.” Yes, “reaffirmed,” for Kim did the same—committed to bringing about a Korean Peninsula free of nuclear weapons—at his summit meeting with South Korean President Moon Jae-in in April 2018. The last clause of the third article of the Panmunjom Declaration of 27 April 2018 issued by the leaders of the two Koreas, “confirmed the...

The Guardian view on Trump in Singapore: a huge win – for North Korea

The Guardian view on Trump in Singapore: a huge win – for North Korea (THE GUARDIAN'S EDITORIAL) A confident leader strode into the Singapore summit and won. Kim Jong-un went with a plan, gave little and left with plenty: bolstered status and diplomatic leverage, lavish praise from the US president, the promise of an end to US-South Korean military drills – and, surely, a growing confidence that North Korea is doing well at this game. A meeting supposed to effect a breakthrough on denuclearisation looked “more like a big welcome party to the nuclear-armed club”, in the acid but accurate words of one observer. Better than war, for sure. But since it was Donald Trump who raised that spectre, giving him credit for dispelling it would be like calling a man a life-saver when second thoughts stay his hand from murder. The US president handed over gift after gift in exchange for the inflation of his ego. He does not know or does not care that his country went home poorer than it came...