{"id":3162,"date":"2026-10-23T11:03:52","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T06:03:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=3162"},"modified":"2026-10-23T11:03:52","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T06:03:52","slug":"us-south-korean-officials-see-little-chance-of-trump-kim-meeting-this-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=3162","title":{"rendered":"US, South Korean officials see little chance of Trump-Kim meeting this year"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

US and South Korean officials see the chances of a meeting between President Donald Trump<\/a> and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un this year fading, according to \u200bfive people with knowledge of the situation.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Trump, the only US president to have met a North Korean leader, has been eager to jump-start talks with North \u200cKorea, but Pyongyang has shown little interest in diplomacy aimed at containing its nuclear program.<\/p>\n

The US has received no response from North Korea on holding a Trump-Kim meeting, and there is little time left before a regional summit in China next month where it might occur, said the five people \u2014 four of them briefed by senior officials from the US and South Korea, as well as a South Korean official.<\/p>\n

North Korean state media has \u200bsaid Pyongyang would put tough conditions on agreeing to a bilateral summit, potentially including sanctions relief, even as Kim\u2019s powerful sister has said the two leaders have an \u201cexcellent\u201d relationship.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Trump \u2019open to talks, nothing scheduled, official says<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In August, the Republican president said he planned to meet<\/a> with Kim later this year and that the North \u2060Korean leader had responded to his outreach.<\/a><\/p>\n

South Korea\u2019s intelligence agency told lawmakers late last month that there was a 50% chance of Trump and Kim meeting on the sidelines of the November \u200b18-19 summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation group in Shenzhen, China.<\/p>\n

But on Monday, Trump, who met Kim three times in his first term, downplayed the prospects<\/a> of such a meeting happening during the \u200bAPEC meeting or a regional summit in the Philippines,<\/a> also in November.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get along with him very well, and I\u2019m not sure that anybody\u2019s asking for a meeting,\u201d Trump told reporters at the White House.<\/p>\n

Another South Korean official familiar with the matter said Pyongyang has made no move indicating it is preparing for a meeting with Trump. All of the people spoke on the condition of anonymity to relay private conversations.<\/p>\n

South Korea\u2019s foreign ministry \u200bdid not immediately respond to a request for comment. Last week, Seoul\u2019s ambassador to Washington, Kang Kyung-wha, said no concrete progress had been made toward a Trump-Kim summit.<\/p>\n

North Korea\u2019s permanent mission \u200bto the UN did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n

\u201cPresident Trump in his first term held three historic summits with North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un that stabilised the Korean Peninsula,\u201d said a \u200cWhite House official \u2060on condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n

\u201cUS policy on North Korea has not changed. President Trump remains open to talking with Kim Jong Un, without any preconditions. No meetings to announce at this time. The leaders will meet at the appropriate time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last month, a senior US official told reporters that Trump was \u201cready\u201d to speak with Kim and that \u201cthe ball is very much in North Korea\u2019s court.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/a>A Trump-Kim summit could come abruptly<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Ankit Panda, a senior fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said there is less than a 10% chance of a meeting between Trump \u200band Kim at the APEC summit.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf Trump wants \u200ba meeting with Kim, I think the \u2060North Koreans are looking for a costly public signal,\u201d Panda said, arguing that a recent US decision to scale back exercises with South Korea had not been sufficient.<\/p>\n

Washington has occasionally sought the assistance of China, which has maintained close ties<\/a> with Kim, in brokering talks with North Korea.<\/p>\n

But cordial \u200btalks between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, set to continue at APEC, have not produced breakthroughs with Pyongyang.<\/p>\n

The two Koreas remain \u200btechnically at war under a \u2060truce that ended fighting in the 1950-53 Korean War.<\/p>\n

The US stations about 28,500 troops and military hardware in South Korea in combined defence against North Korea, which has pursued nuclear arms and ballistic-missile development.<\/p>\n

South Korean officials, citing private research group estimates, have said North Korea possesses between 80 and 120 nuclear warheads.<\/a><\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s meetings with Kim in 2018 and 2019, while historic, yielded no concrete results.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know \u2060when they\u2019re \u200bgoing to meet,\u201d US Ambassador to South Korea Michelle Steel told an event in Seoul organised by the American \u200bChamber of Commerce in Korea on Wednesday. If they could arrange a meeting, she said, it would likely be announced abruptly.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it happens, then it\u2019s going to happen the next day or within a couple of days\u2019 notice.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US and South Korean officials see the chances of a meeting between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un this year fading, according to \u200bfive people with knowledge of the situation. Trump, the only US president to have met a North Korean leader, has been eager to jump-start talks with North \u200cKorea, but Pyongyang has shown little interest in diplomacy aimed at containing its nuclear program. The US has received no response from North Korea on holding a Trump-Kim meeting, and there is little time left before…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3162\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}