Sister Of North Korea's Kim Doubts Pyongyang-Washington Summit To Be Held In 2020

SEOUL (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 10th July, 2020) Talks between the leaders of the United States and North Korea (DPRK) are unlikely to be held this year, as only Washington expresses interest in this "unpractical" summit, Kim Yo Jong, the first deputy director of the Propaganda and Agitation Department of the Workers' Party of Korea and sister of the North Korean leader, said on Friday.

On Thursday, the US State Department said that Washington continues to be prepared to engage in talks with North Korea.

"It was good enough for me to kill breakfast time by watching the tv news about the changes of the Americans' mind-set who went the length of indicating signals of the possibility of the DPRK-U.S. summit talks. It is still my personal opinion, however, I doubt that things like the DPRK-U.S. summit talks would happen this year," Kim Yo Jong said, as quoted by the Korean Central News Agency.

She added that the possibility of the summit depended only on US President Doland Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

In addition, Kim Yo Jong mentioned that North Korea was committed to denuclearization, but the US should first abandon its "hostile policy" towards Pyongyang.

In December 2019, the North Korean leadership promised the "Christmas gift," presumably meaning a long-range missile launch, to the US unless it changes its stance in the denuclearization talks. However, North Korea did not make any hostile movements at that time.

Kim Yo Jong said that although North Korea did not give the US a "Christmas gift," Washington should be worried that such a gift could be sent on the eve of the US presidential elections in November. At the same time, the first deputy director said that North Korea was not going to make threats.