MOSCOW, February 25. /TASS/. Pyongyang’s negotiators have not accepted Washington’s proposals for the Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi, but spontaneous decisions are highly likely during the contacts between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Director of the Russian Strategy for Asia Center of the Institute of Economics at Russia’s Academy of Sciences Georgy Toloraya told TASS on Monday.
"As far as I know from the sidelines, the North Korean negotiators have not given anything to the Americans so far," Toloraya noted. "They are saving the goodies for the leaders, and spontaneous decisions are not ruled out whereupon Trump gives something and Kim Jong-un will also hand something over in return. Apparently, this will be a rather dramatic show."
According to the veteran diplomat, the expectations from the summit are high and the parties are likely to try to pass a joint declaration outlining North Korea’s particular steps on denuclearization and reciprocal US moves, including a rollback of a number of sanctions. "Evidently, it will touch upon the sanctions slapped on inter-Korean and humanitarian projects, and possibly also progress towards a peace declaration, and even touching on the subject of ending the Korean War," he noted. "This would be deeply symbolic, though this is non-binding for the US."
The expert voiced his doubts over whether Pyongyang will be completely ready to give up its nuclear weapon arsenal, which is needed to fully prevent any military interference. The US has limited opportunities of using sanctions to achieve its desired result, since Washington will unlikely be able to exert enough pressure on the North Koreans. "The North Korean people cannot revolt, this society is under very tight control," he said.
Toloraya also doubts that the Trump-Kim summit will encourage fulfilling trilateral railway and energy projects between Moscow, Pyongyang and Seoul by exempting them from sanctions. "We are actively working with South Korea on including these projects in a draft to remove the sanctions, but the Americans won’t be satisfied by Russia’s growing role and it carrying out trilateral projects. We will do our best. But I will be pleasantly surprised if something comes out of it," he stressed.
The first-ever summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was held on June 12, 2018 in Singapore. The parties signed a joint document, in which Pyongyang committed to denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula in return for US security guarantees. The second meeting of the two leaders is scheduled to be held in Hanoi on February 27-28.