The president’s fiery rhetoric appears at odds with the State Department’s quiet diplomatic efforts with the repressive regime.
The Trump administration has been pursuing backchannel talks with North Korea, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the matter, even as the president himself threatens to undermine such efforts with his off-the-cuff and inflammatory rhetoric toward the emerging nuclear power.
The two officials confirmed to POLITICO that the State Department has been involved in diplomatic communications with North Korea, with one official adding that the National Security Council staff had also explored backchannel discussions.
The Associated Press reported earlier on Friday that Joseph Yun, the U.S. envoy for North Korea policy, has been in regular contact with Pak Song Il, a senior North Korean diplomat at the country’s mission at the United Nations. The AP report indicated that the discussions had not eased fears of a military confrontation, but could prove a foundation for negotiations going forward.
Yun was known to have been in touch with North Korean counterparts to help secure the release of Otto Warmbier, an American imprisoned in North Korea. Warmbier was delivered to the U.S. in a coma, and he died a few days afterward. Still, according to the AP, Yun has kept up the contacts.
The news of the diplomatic effort, however, came as Trump continued to escalate his rhetoric toward North Korea, warning dictator Kim Jong Un on Friday that U.S. military is “locked and loaded” in case his regime acts “unwisely.”
It was his latest broadside, after causing alarm worldwide on Tuesday by threatening that North Korea would “be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen” if the country did not stop provoking the United States. One White House official described the comment as “impromptu” and said other senior aides had no warning that Trump would make such an incendiary statement.
Former officials cautioned that Trump appeared to be undercutting the chances of any diplomatic effort.
The president’s public comments “undermine anyone in Pyongyang who’s interested in seeing if there’s something to be gained in a dialogue with the United States,” said former State Department official Joel S. Wit, the founder of 38 North, a website that analyzes North Korea. “The hardliners in Washington reinforce the hardliners in Pyongyang, who in turn reinforce the hardliners in Washington.”
North Korea’s response to Trump’s rhetoric has been to threaten Guam, where the U.S. has a major military presence. North Korean state media have reported that military leaders are working on a plan to launch missiles into waters near the island.
In remarks to reporters Friday, Trump refused to talk about any backchannel discussions, but he defended his recent rhetoric, saying critics were unfairly targeting him and that there are “tens of millions of people in this country that are so happy with what I’m saying, because they’re saying, finally, we have a president that’s sticking up for our nation and frankly sticking up for our friends and our allies.”
North Korea’s leader, Trump added, “will not get away with what he’s doing, believe me. And if he utters one threat in the form of an overt threat, which, by the way, he has been uttering for years, and his family has been uttering for years, or if he does anything with respect to Guam or any place else that’s an American territory or an American ally, he will truly regret it, and he will regret it fast.”
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Trump threatens to undermine U.S. backchannel talks with North Korea https://t.co/1P3yvchKXA pic.twitter.com/9UOy6jzmZi
— POLITICO (@politico) August 12, 2017
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