WASHINGTON, October 6. /TASS/. US diplomats had "good discussions" with the North Korean delegation in the Swedish capital, Stockholm, US Department of State Spokesperson Morgan Ortagus said on Saturday.
"The early comments from the DPRK delegation do not reflect the content or the spirit of today's 8 1/2 hour discussion. The U.S. brought creative ideas and had good discussions with its DPRK counterparts," she said.
According to Ortagus, during the consultations, the US delegation "reviewed events since the Singapore summit, and discussed the importance of more intensive engagement to solve the many issues of concern for both sides."
"The U.S. delegation previewed a number of new initiatives that would allow us to make progress in each of the four pillars of the Singapore joint statement," the spokesperson said.
She added that the two nations "will not overcome a legacy of 70 years of war and hostility on the Korean Peninsula through the course of a single Saturday."
"These are weighty issues, and they require a strong commitment by both countries. The United States has that commitment," Ortagus continued.
New talks in two weeks
The US delegation accepted Sweden’s invitation to return to Stockholm two weeks later and to continue consultations with North Korean envoys, the US Department of State spokesperson said.
"At the conclusion of our discussions, the United States proposed to accept the invitation of our Swedish hosts to return to Stockholm to meet again in two weeks time, in order to continue discussions on all of the topics. The United States delegation has accepted this invitation," the spokesperson said in a statement.
She did not elaborate on how the North Korean delegation reacted to the proposal.
Meanwhile, Sweden’s Dagens Nyheter newspaper said on Saturday the consultations in Sweden had broken off.
"We are disappointed by the US, who brought nothing to the negotiating table," the paper quoted North Korean negotiator Kim Myong Gil as saying at a briefing near the republic’s embassy in Sweden. "As far as the resumption of dialogue is concerned, the ball is now in the US court."
The SVT TV channel earlier reported that a preliminary bilateral meeting between North Korea and the United States began on Friday at the Villa Elfvik Strand, followed by working-level consultations on Saturday.
US-N.Korean summits
US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have so far met three times, their latest encounter was a brief meeting in the Panmunjom demilitarized zone on June 30.
Trump and Kim Jong-un held the first ever U.S.-North Korea summit in Singapore in 2018. The meeting yielded a joint document where Pyongyang committed itself to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in exchange for security guarantees from Washington.
The two leaders had their second meeting on February 27-28, 2019 in Hanoi. After a series of meetings, including one-on-one talks, they were unable to come to an agreement and did not sign any joint documents.