Trump sees no need to fix timeline for NK denuclearization

Published : Sept 27, 2018 - 09:13 Updated : Sept 27, 2018 - 09:13

WASHINGTON -- US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he sees no need to set a timeline for North Korea's denuclearization as long as the regime has stopped its nuclear testing.

Speaking in a press conference in New York, Trump said he doesn't want to be drawn into a "time game" over how long it will take to dismantle the North's nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.

"If it takes two years, three years or five months, doesn't matter. There's no nuclear testing, and there's no testing of rockets," he said at the end of his visit to the United Nations General Assembly.

US President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference at the Lotte New York Palace hotel during the United Nations General Assembly, Wednesday, Sept. 26, in New York. (AP)

Trump said North Korea plans to shut down more of its missile and nuclear sites but wouldn't give details.

"They have no interest right now in testing nuclear," he said.

Trump met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore in June. The two men agreed that North Korea would work toward "complete denuclearization" of the Korean Peninsula in exchange for security guarantees from the US.

A second summit has been in the works, and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo plans to fly to Pyongyang next month to set it up, the State Department said earlier in the day.

Trump has repeatedly said that he is in no rush to denuclearize the North despite criticism that the summit deal should have committed the North to concrete steps, including a timeline and a declaration of its nuclear arsenal.

Kim recently told South Korean officials that he would like to achieve denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula before the end of Trump's first term in early 2021.

Pompeo confirmed last week that that was the timeline the two sides would aim for. (Yonhap)