PYONGYANG, North Korea — North Korea accused the Trump administration Saturday of pushing a “unilateral and gangster-like demand’’ that it abandon its nuclear weapons.
Hours after Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said his two days of talks in the North Korean capital were “productive,’’ the country’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement criticizing the pressure for denuclearization as “deeply regrettable.’’
Despite North Korea’s criticism, its Foreign Ministry said the North’s leader, Kim Jong Un, still wants to build on the “friendly relationship and trust’’ forged with President Trump during their summit in Singapore on June 12.
‘‘We had expected that the US side would offer constructive measures that would help build trust based on the spirit of the leaders’ summit,’’ the statement said.
“We were also thinking about providing reciprocal measures,’’ it added.
The ministry also said Kim had written a personal letter to Trump reiterating trust in their relationship.
Pompeo and his entourage offered no immediate evidence after talks ended that they had come away with anything tangible to show that the reclusive country was willing to surrender its nuclear and missile weapons programs.
He did not meet with the North Korean leader but held talks with Kim Yong Chol, a senior North Korean official who has been negotiating with Americans for decades.
“These are complicated issues, but we made progress on almost all of the central issues,’’ Pompeo said Saturday in Pyongyang just before boarding a plane for Tokyo.
However, the North Korean Foreign Ministry’s assessment was decidedly less upbeat. “The attitude and demands from the US side during the high-level talks were nothing short of deeply regrettable,’’ it said.
Pompeo came to Pyongyang to try to get the North Koreans to match their vague commitment to denuclearization — signed by Kim in the June meeting with Trump — with some kind of action.
Among the first priorities were a declaration of weapons sites, a timetable of deconstruction efforts and, perhaps, a written statement that the North’s definition of denuclearization matched Pompeo’s.
Asked if he had gotten any of those, Pompeo declined to divulge details.
Washington insists that North Korea disclose all the details of its nuclear weapons program, dismantle its facilities, and let outside inspectors verify the steps.
The idea is to remove all the North’s nuclear arms and ability to build more, before offering any significant rewards.
But the North has long rejected such an approach, instead demanding the United States take reciprocal measures in each “phased’’ step it takes toward denuclearization.
On Saturday, the North Korean statement reiterated that “phased, simultaneous actions’’ were “the quickest way of realizing the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.’’
During their meetings with Pompeo, North Korean officials proposed dismantling a missile engine test site and opening negotiations for repatriating the remains of US service members killed in the Korean War, the Foreign Ministry said.
In return, they proposed the United States take “simultaneous’’ actions of expanding bilateral exchanges and announcing an end to the Korean War in July. But the ministry said the United States balked at the proposal for declaring an end to the war, which North Korea said was a crucial first step toward building trust.
“The issues the US side insisted on during the talks were the same cancerous ones that the past US administrations had insisted on,’’ the ministry said.
It said North Korea had so far taken the “irreversible’’ action of destroying its underground nuclear test site, while the United States had taken only the “reversible’’ action of suspending joint military exercises with South Korea.
Privately, Pompeo has said he doubts the North Korean leader will ever give up his nuclear weapons. And those doubts have been reinforced in recent days by intelligence showing that North Korea, far from dismantling its weapons facilities, has been expanding them and taking steps to conceal the efforts.
Trump has said his summit with Kim was a success, and he has declared the North “no longer a nuclear threat.’’ Squaring Trump’s evaluation with what increasingly seems like a more troubling reality has become one of Pompeo’s greatest challenges as the United States’ chief diplomat.
It was Pompeo’s third trip to Pyongyang, but the first time he had spent the night. Even so, it appeared to have been his least productive visit.
There had been hopes that Pompeo would get the North to agree to release the remains of US war dead. But Pompeo said that another meeting had been set up for July 12 for further talks on repatriating the remains.
