As Two Koreas Talk Peace, Trump's Bargaining Chips Slip Away

By MARK LANDLER APRIL 28, 2018

WASHINGTON — President Trump lost no time hailing the historic nature of Friday’s meeting between the leaders of North and South Korea. But the gauzy images and vows of peace by Kim Jong-un and his counterpart from the South, Moon Jae-in, have complicated Mr. Trump’s task as he prepares for his own history-making encounter with Mr. Kim.

While the two Korean leaders pledged to rid the heavily armed peninsula of nuclear weapons, they put no timeline on that process, nor did they set out a common definition of what a nuclear-free Korea would look like. Instead, they agreed to pursue a peace treaty this year that would formally end the Korean War after nearly seven decades of hostilities.

The talk of peace is likely to weaken the two levers that Mr. Trump used to pressure Mr. Kim to come to the bargaining table. A resumption of regular diplomatic exchanges between the two Koreas, analysts said, will inevitably erode the crippling economic sanctions against the North, while Mr. Trump will find it hard to threaten military action against a country that is extending an olive branch.

To meet his own definition of success, Mr. Trump will have to persuade Mr. Kim to accept “complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization” of North Korea — something that Mr. Kim has shown no willingness to accept in the past, and few believe he will accede to in the future.

“This summit has put even greater expectations, greater hype and greater pressure on Trump,” said Victor D. Cha, a Korea scholar at Georgetown University who was considered by the Trump administration to be ambassador to Seoul. “He hyped this meeting with his tweets, and now the entire focus is going to be on his negotiating prowess.”

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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/28/us/politics/trump-north-korea.html