Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un have very different objectives from their on-again, off-again negotiations. More work needs to be done to build trust and align the leaders on a basic common goal.
US President Donald Trump stole the show over the weekend with seeming breakthroughs on the China trade war and North Korea. Disaster has been averted, but for how long?
Every time North Korea needles the US with another provocation, it makes it harder for Donald Trump to mobilise the domestic support for a return to the negotiating table.
North Korea is a major military threat to the US and its Asian allies, but exactly how powerful are its nuclear weapons? An earth scientist explains why it’s hard to answer this question.
With all the drama between Trump and Kim, it’s easy to forget that the US is not the only nation involved in denuclearizing North Korea. China is hugely influential — but it’s not clear quite how.
Donald Trump is unmoved by high risks and wild odds, apparently feeling that his sheer cunning will always win, including, now, in geopolitics — his latest casino.
At this stage one can only judge the atmospherics and optics of the summit, and on that basis, Beijing and Pyongyang have plainly come out ahead, while Tokyo and Seoul seem to have been overlooked.
One noticeable omission was any mention of “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearisation” - whether this was strategy or capitulation on President Donald Trump’s part remains to be seen.
The highly awaited summit has the potential to lead to real peace on the peninsula- but only if both countries can find a common interest on which to build an agreement.
The end of denuclearisation politics has opened new possibilities for the direction of the Korean Peninsula, but the tensions of 2017 remind us of the possibility of disaster.