Pompeo says North Korea sanctions to remain until complete denuclearization

The United States secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, has said that tough sanctions will remain on North Korea until its complete denuclearization.

U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un after their Singapore meeting issued a joint statement that reaffirmed the North’s commitment to “work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula”, while Trump “committed to providing security guarantees.”

Trump later told a news conference he would end joint U.S.-South Korean military exercises.

“President Trump has been incredibly clear about the sequencing of denuclearization and relief from the sanctions,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters after meeting South Korea’s president and Japan’s foreign minister in Seoul.

“We are going to get complete denuclearization; only then will there be relief from the sanctions,” he said.

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North Korean state media reported on Wednesday Kim and Trump had recognized the principle of “step-by-step and simultaneous action” to achieve peace and denuclearization on the Korean peninsula.

The summit statement provided no details on when North Korea would give up its nuclear weapons program or how the dismantling might be verified.

Sceptics of how much the meeting achieved pointed to the North Korean leadership’s long-held view that nuclear weapons are a bulwark against what it fears are the U.S. plans to overthrow it and unite the Korean peninsula.