WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump declared Wednesday that the North Korean regime no longer poses a nuclear threat following his summit with Kim Jong Un.
“Just landed – a long trip, but everybody can now feel much safer than the day I took office,” Trump tweeted as he arrived back in Washington. “There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea.”
Trump also said that his meeting with Kim was an “interesting and very positive experience” and that “North Korea has great potential for the future!”
Trump also said in a separate tweet that North Korea is “no longer” the US’ “biggest and most dangerous problem,” telling Americans and the rest of the world they can “sleep well tonight!”
After returning to the White House Wednesday, Trump also defended his decision to halt the joint military exercises with South Korea, which he called “war games” — a term used by Pyongyang — arguing on Twitter that the US will “save a fortune.”
After nearly five hours of unprecedented talks between Trump and Kim on Tuesday, the two leaders signed a document in which Kim “reaffirmed his firm and unwavering commitment to complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” and the US agreed to “provide security guarantees.”
However, there was no mention of the previous US aim of “complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization” from Pyongyang. Kim’s commitments did not appear to go beyond what he already pledged to do in April when he met with South Korean President Moon Jae-in along their countries’ border.
Following the summit, Trump told reporters during a news conference in Singapore that Kim agreed to “destroying a major missile engine testing site” and that it would be done “very soon,” without elaborating further on which testing site or timing.
The President also added that North Korea’s promise to complete denuclearization “will be verified,” though the document the two leaders signed did not lay out details of that process.
Trump left the discussions assured that Kim would begin dismantling his country’s missile sites in the immediate future, telling ABC News that Kim “trusts me, and I trust him.”