The top US diplomat canceled a planned meeting with his Indian counterpart slated for next Friday in order to make the trip, it said, quoting four people familiar with the plans.

At the summit, Kim committed to work towards “complete denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula in exchange for security guarantees from the United States. Details are expected to be hashed out in forthcoming negotiations.

Asked to confirm the trip, a State Department official told Yonhap on background that, “We have no travel to announce at this time.”

Pompeo traveled twice to Pyongyang in recent months to lay the groundwork for the historic Singapore summit. Meeting both times with Kim, he sought to determine the regime’s seriousness about dismantling a nuclear program that has posed a direct threat to the US

Last year Pyongyang tested three intercontinental ballistic missiles and its sixth nuclear weapon, leading to a fiery exchange of threats and personal insults between Trump and Kim.

In recent remarks to CNN, Pompeo refused to put a timeline on negotiations with the reclusive regime. Instead he said he would “constantly reassess” progress in the talks to determine whether they should continue.

North Korea is accused of prolonging past nuclear negotiations in a bid to draw more concessions from the US and other international interlocutors. The top US diplomat previously set a goal of 2020 to achieve the North’s denuclearization before the end of Trump’s term.

Speaking at a Senate hearing on Wednesday, Pompeo said he is confident the North Koreans understand “the scope of the request we’re making with respect to denuclearization.” (Yonhap)

 

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo listens while appearing before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on the FY2019 budget, Wednesday, at Capitol Hill in Washington.  (AP-Yonhap)