SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea on Wednesday threatened to scrap a historic summit next month between its leader, Kim Jong Un, and U.S. President Donald Trump, saying it has no interest in a "one-sided" affair meant to pressure the North to abandon its nuclear weapons.

The warning by North Korea's first vice foreign minister came hours after the country abruptly canceled a high-level meeting with South Korea to protest U.S.-South Korean military exercises that the North has long claimed are an invasion rehearsal.

The surprise moves appear to cool what had been an unusual flurry of outreach from a country that last year conducted a provocative series of weapons tests that had many fearing the region was on the edge of war. Analysts said it's unlikely that North Korea intends to scuttle all diplomacy. More likely, they said, is that it wants to gain leverage ahead of the talks between Kim and Trump, scheduled for June 12 in Singapore.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the Trump administration is "still hopeful" that a planned summit with North Korea will take place.

Sanders said Wednesday that threats from the North to scrap the meeting were "something that we fully expected."

Sanders said President Donald Trump is "ready for very tough negotiations," adding that "if they want to meet, we'll be ready and if they don't that's OK." She said if there is no meeting, the U.S. would "continue with the campaign of maximum pressure" against the North.

North Korean first vice foreign minister Kim Kye Gwan said in a statement carried by state media that "we are no longer interested in a negotiation that will be all about driving us into a corner and making a one-sided demand for us to give up our nukes and this would force us to reconsider whether we would accept the North Korea-U.S. summit meeting."

He criticized recent comments by Trump's top security adviser, John Bolton, and other U.S. officials who have said the North should follow the "Libyan model" of nuclear disarmament and provide a "complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement." He also took issue with U.S. views that the North should fully relinquish its biological and chemical weapons.

Some analysts say bringing up Libya, which dismantled its rudimentary nuclear program in the 2000s in exchange for sanctions relief, jeopardizes progress in negotiations with the North. Kim Jong Un took power weeks after former Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's gruesome death at the hands of rebel forces amid a popular uprising in October 2011. The North has frequently used Gadhafi's death to justify its own nuclear development in the face of perceived U.S. threats.

The North's warning Wednesday fits a past North Korean pattern of raising tensions to bolster its positions ahead of negotiations with Washington and Seoul. But the country also has a long history of scrapping deals with its rivals at the last minute.

In 2013, North Korea abruptly canceled reunions for families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War just days before they were scheduled to begin to protest what it called rising animosities ahead of joint drills between Seoul and Washington. In 2012, the North conducted a prohibited long-range rocket launch weeks after it agreed to suspend weapons tests in return for food assistance.

On Wednesday, senior officials from the two Koreas were to sit down at a border village to discuss how to implement their leaders' recent agreements to reduce military tensions along their heavily fortified border and improve overall ties. But hours before the meeting was to start, the North informed the South that it would "indefinitely suspend" the talks, according to Seoul's Unification Ministry. </s> North Korea on Wednesday threatened to scrap a historic summit next month between its leader, Kim Jong Un, and U.S. President Donald Trump, saying it has no interest in a "one-sided" affair meant to pressure the North to abandon its nuclear weapons.

The warning by North Korea's first vice foreign minister came hours after the country abruptly canceled a high-level meeting with South Korea to protest U.S.-South Korean military exercises that the North has long claimed are an invasion rehearsal.

The surprise moves appear to cool what had been an unusual flurry of outreach from a country that last year conducted a provocative series of weapons tests that had many fearing the region was on the edge of war. Analysts said it's unlikely that North Korea intends to scuttle all diplomacy. More likely, they said, is that it wants to gain leverage ahead of the talks between Kim and Trump, scheduled for June 12 in Singapore.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the Trump administration is "still hopeful" that a planned summit with North Korea will take place.

Sanders said Wednesday that threats from the North to scrap the meeting were "something that we fully expected."

Sanders said President Donald Trump is "ready for very tough negotiations," adding that "if they want to meet, we'll be ready and if they don't that's OK." She said if there is no meeting, the U.S. would "continue with the campaign of maximum pressure" against the North.

North Korean first vice foreign minister Kim Kye Gwan said in a statement carried by state media that "we are no longer interested in a negotiation that will be all about driving us into a corner and making a one-sided demand for us to give up our nukes and this would force us to reconsider whether we would accept the North Korea-U.S. summit meeting."

He criticized recent comments by Trump's top security adviser, John Bolton, and other U.S. officials who have said the North should follow the "Libyan model" of nuclear disarmament and provide a "complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement." He also took issue with U.S. views that the North should fully relinquish its biological and chemical weapons.

Some analysts say bringing up Libya, which dismantled its rudimentary nuclear program in the 2000s in exchange for sanctions relief, jeopardizes progress in negotiations with the North. Kim Jong Un took power weeks after former Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's gruesome death at the hands of rebel forces amid a popular uprising in October 2011. The North has frequently used Gadhafi's death to justify its own nuclear development in the face of perceived U.S. threats.

The North's warning Wednesday fits a past North Korean pattern of raising tensions to bolster its positions ahead of negotiations with Washington and Seoul. But the country also has a long history of scrapping deals with its rivals at the last minute.

In 2013, North Korea abruptly canceled reunions for families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War just days before they were scheduled to begin to protest what it called rising animosities ahead of joint drills between Seoul and Washington. In 2012, the North conducted a prohibited long-range rocket launch weeks after it agreed to suspend weapons tests in return for food assistance.

On Wednesday, senior officials from the two Koreas were to sit down at a border village to discuss how to implement their leaders' recent agreements to reduce military tensions along their heavily fortified border and improve overall ties. But hours before the meeting was to start, the North informed the South that it would "indefinitely suspend" the talks, according to Seoul's Unification Ministry.

In a pre-dawn dispatch, the North's official Korean Central News Agency, or KCNA, called the two-week Max Thunder drills, which began Monday and reportedly include about 100 aircraft, an "intended military provocation" and an "apparent challenge" to last month's summit between Kim Jong Un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, when the leaders met at the border in their countries' third summit talks since their formal division in 1948.

"The United States must carefully contemplate the fate of the planned North Korea-U.S. summit amid the provocative military ruckus that it's causing with South Korean authorities," the North said. "We'll keenly monitor how the United States and South Korean authorities will react."

Kim Dong-yub, a North Korea expert at Seoul's Institute for Far Eastern Studies, said the North isn't trying to undermine the Trump-Kim talks. The North's reaction is more like a "complaint over Trump's way of playing the good cop and bad cop game with (Secretary of State Mike) Pompeo and Bolton," he said.

Seoul's Unification Ministry, which is responsible for inter-Korean affairs, called North Korea's move "regrettable" and urged a quick return to talks. The Defense Ministry said the drills with the United States would go on as planned.

Annual military drills between Washington and Seoul have long been a major source of contention between the Koreas, and analysts have wondered whether their continuation would hurt the detente that, since an outreach by Kim in January, has replaced the insults and threats of war. Much larger springtime drills took place last month without the North's typically fiery condemnation or accompanying weapons tests, though Washington and Seoul toned down those exercises.

The KCNA dispatch said the U.S. aircraft mobilized for the drills include nuclear-capable B-52 bombers and stealth F-22 fighter jets, two of the U.S. military assets it has previously said are aimed at launching nuclear strikes on the North. Seoul has said F-22s are involved in the drills, but has not confirmed whether B-52s are taking part.

In Washington, the U.S. State Department emphasized that Kim had previously indicated he understood the need and purpose of the U.S. continuing its long-planned exercises with South Korea. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said the U.S. had not heard anything directly from North or South Korea that would change that.

"We will continue to go ahead and plan the meeting between President Trump and Kim Jong Un," Nauert said.

U.S. Army Col. Rob Manning said the current exercise is part of the U.S. and South Korea's "routine, annual training program to maintain a foundation of military readiness." Manning, a Pentagon spokesman, said the purpose of Max Thunder and exercise Foal Eagle — another training event — is to enhance the two nations' abilities to operate together to defend South Korea.

"The defensive nature of these combined exercises has been clear for many decades and has not changed," Manning said.

Washington and Seoul delayed the earlier round of springtime drills because of the North-South diplomacy surrounding February's Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in the South, which saw Kim send his sister to the opening ceremonies.

Kim told visiting South Korean officials in March that he "understands" the drills would take place and expressed hope that they'll be modified once the situation on the peninsula stabilizes, according to the South Korean government.

Despite Kim's outreach, some experts were skeptical about whether he would completely give up a nuclear program that he had pushed so hard to build. The North previously vowed to continue nuclear development unless the United States pulls its 28,500 troops out of South Korea and withdraws its so-called "nuclear umbrella" security guarantee to South Korea and Japan as a condition for its nuclear disarmament.

Wednesday's threat could also be targeted at showing a domestic audience that Kim is willing to stand up to Washington. Kim has repeatedly told his people that his nukes are a "powerful treasured sword" that can smash U.S. hostility.

On Tuesday, South Korea's military said North Korea was moving ahead with plans to close its nuclear test site next week, an assessment backed by U.S. researchers who say satellite images show the North has begun dismantling facilities at the site.

The site's closure was set to come before the Kim-Trump summit, which had been shaping up as a crucial moment in the decades-long push to resolve the nuclear standoff with the North, which is closing in on the ability to viably target the mainland United States with its long-range nuclear-armed missiles.

Associated Press writers Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul and Lolita Baldor, Josh Lederman and Catherine Lucey in Washington contributed to this report. </s> The White House said Wednesday that it "fully expected" threats by North Korea to potentially cancel Kim Jong Un 's meeting with President Donald Trump . In a series of statements this week, the country's state media agency said Kim was considering pulling out of the summit due to joint air force drills taking place in South Korea."This is something that we fully expected," press secretary Sarah Sanders told reporters at the White House today. "The president is very used to being ready for tough negotiations and if they want to meet, we'll be ready, and if they don't, that's okay, too."Hours later, President Trump reacted to the statements for the first time when pressed by reporters in an Oval Office meeting alongside Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev."We haven't been notified at all," Trump said. "We'll have to see. We haven't seen anything, we haven't heard anything. We will see what happens."North Korea's announcement, issued Tuesday evening by state news organization KCNA, appeared to catch the State Department off guard, with spokesperson Heather Nauert telling reporters the U.S. had not heard from North Korea directly before the announcement.Earlier Wednesday, Sanders clarified the administration's plan if the summit were to be canceled."We're going to continue with the campaign of maximum pressure if that's the case," Sanders said. "But like I said if they want to meet, the president will certainly be ready and we'll be prepared. If not, that's okay."Sanders also appeared to distance the Trump administration from comments its national security adviser, John Bolton, made this past Sunday regarding the denuclearization model being pursued on the Korean peninsula.Bolton has repeatedly said that the administration plans to pursue "the Libya model," which calls for a strict monitoring and inspection plan to ensure North Korea has denuclearized.North Korea's first vice minister for foreign affairs, Kim Kye Gwan, directly criticized the model in a lengthy statement Wednesday night, accusing U.S. officials of "provoking" the country with "unbridled remarks.""High-ranking officials of the White House and the Department of State including Bolton, White House national security adviser, are letting loose the assertions of so-called Libya mode of nuclear abandonment," the statement read."The U.S. is miscalculating the magnanimity and broad-minded initiatives of the DPRK as signs of weakness and trying to embellish and advertise as if these are the product of its sanctions and pressure," the statement added. "It is ridiculous comedy to see the Trump administration, claiming to take a different road from the previous administration, still clings to the outdated policy on the DPRK."Sanders told reporters gathered in the North Lawn driveway at the White House Wednesday that the Libya model is not a part of any administration policy she's aware of."I haven't seen that as part of any discussions, I'm not aware that that's a model that we're using," Sanders said. "Again, this is the President Trump model. He's gonna run this the way he sees fit. We're 100 percent confident -- as we've said many times before, as you all know, you're aware -- he's the best negotiator, and we're very confident in that."The episode has drawn parallels to the breakdown in the Bush Administration's nuclear negotiations with North Korea in 2008. At the time, Kim's father, Kim Jong Il , balked at requests for a strict inspections program similar to what President George W. Bush had utilized to eliminate Libya's nuclear program in 2003 and 2004."There's not a cookie-cutter model on how this works," Sanders said in response to Bolton's championing of that model. </s> North Korea has said it may pull out of a summit with US President Donald Trump if the US insists it gives up its nuclear weapons.

The highly anticipated meeting between Mr Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un is due to take place on 12 June.

But in an angry statement, North Korea’s vice-foreign minister accused the US of making reckless statements and of harbouring sinister intentions.

He pointed the finger squarely at US National Security Adviser John Bolton.

“We do not hide our feeling of repugnance towards him,” Kim Kye-gwan said.

The groundbreaking agreement for Mr Kim and Mr Trump to meet came about as North Korea said it was committed to denuclearising the Korean peninsula.

Exactly what that would entail has remained unclear, but North Korea has invited foreign media to witness the dismantling of its main nuclear test site later this month.

Mr Bolton recently said North Korea could follow a “Libya model” of verifiable denuclearisation, but this alarms Pyongyang, which watched Libya’s Colonel Gaddafi give up his nuclear programme only for him to be killed by Western-backed rebels a few years later.

The BBC’s Laura Bicker in Seoul says North Korea – which had long said its nuclear arsenal is essential for its survival as a state – is now making its demands clear. </s> The United States is still hopeful about a planned summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un but President Donald Trump is prepared for a tough negotiation process, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said on Wednesday. North Korea threw next month’s summit between Kim and Trump into doubt on Wednesday, threatening weeks of diplomatic progress by saying it may reconsider if Washington insists it unilaterally gives up its nuclear weapons.

“We’re still hopeful that the meeting will take place and we’ll continue down that path but at the same time we’ve been prepared that these could be tough negotiations,” Sanders said in an interview with Fox News.

“The president is ready if the meeting takes place. If it doesn’t, we’ll continue the maximum pressure campaign that’s been ongoing.”

Read | North Korea says may reconsider summit with Donald Trump, suspends talks with South

Sanders said the comments from North Korea were “not something that is out of the ordinary in these types of operations.”

“The president’s fully prepared and fully ready to carry on in these conversations both leading up to and if the meeting takes place,” she said. “He’ll be there and he’ll be ready.”

According to North Korea’s official KCNA news agency, Pyongyang’s first vice minister of foreign affairs, Kim Kye Gwan, specifically criticized US national security adviser John Bolton, who has called for the North to quickly give up its nuclear arsenal in a deal that mirrors Libya’s abandonment of its weapons of mass destruction.

Sanders played down those concerns. “I haven’t seen that as part of any discussions so I’m not aware that that’s a model that we’re using,” she told reporters at the White House on Wednesday. The Trump-Kim meeting is scheduled for June 12 in Singapore.

For all the latest World News, download Indian Express App </s> North Korea threatened to walk away from its meeting with President Donald Trump next month if the U.S. made a “one-sided demand” for the regime to surrender its nuclear weapons.

North Korea’s first vice foreign minister, Kim Kye Gwan, said the regime was disappointed by recent comments from the U.S., according to a statement published Wednesday by the state-run Korean Central News Agency. The statement cited remarks by National Security Adviser John Bolton urging a “Libya model” for the rapid dismantlement of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

“If the Trump administration takes an approach to the DPRK-U.S. summit with sincerity for improved DPRK-U.S. relations, it will receive a deserved response from us,” Kim Kye Gwan said, using an acronym for North Korea’s formal name. “However, if the U.S. is trying to drive us into a corner to force our unilateral nuclear abandonment, we will no longer be interested in such dialogue and cannot but reconsider our proceeding to the DPRK-U.S. summit.”

Earlier Wednesday, North Korea abruptly canceled talks with South Korea and warned the U.S. to “think twice” about Trump’s summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un scheduled for next month in Singapore. The moves undercut the optimism after Kim agreed to discuss his nuclear weapons program in a first-of-its-kind meeting.

Tensions have built in recent weeks over the steps needed for the U.S. to ease sanctions against North Korea: The Trump administration wants Kim to give up his weapons before getting anything in return, while Kim favors a more phased approach. Stocks tied to expectations of a resumption in inter-Korean business fell on Wednesday.

An earlier KCNA dispatch announcing the decision to suspend “indefinitely” talks with South Korea, cited the allies’ “Max Thunder” military drills and other “improper acts” by authorities in Seoul. “There is a limit in showing goodwill and offering opportunity,” the report said.

The later comments from Kim Kye Gwan indicated broader dissatisfaction with the U.S. approach to talks, and Bolton’s comparisons to Libya in particular.

Kim Jong Un and Bolton Learned Different Lessons From Libya

The last remnants of Libya’s nuclear program were loaded onto an aircraft in 2009 and shipped out of the country, part of a U.S.-brokered deal with dictator Muammar Qaddafi to disarm in return for sanctions relief. Two years later, NATO-backed rebels brutally killed him.

“It is absolutely absurd to dare compare the DPRK, a nuclear weapon state, to Libya which had been at the initial stage of nuclear development,” the vice foreign minister said. “The U.S. is miscalculating the magnanimity and broad-minded initiatives of the DPRK as signs of weakness and trying to embellish and advertise as if these are the product of its sanctions and pressure.”

— With assistance by Andy Sharp, and David Tweed </s> U.S. President Donald Trump has cancelled next month’s summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

In a letter to Kim released Thursday morning, Trump said the face-to-face meeting, set to take place on June 12 in Singapore, was “inappropriate” to have “at this time.”

“Sadly, based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement, I feel it is inappropriate, at this time, to have this long-planned meeting,” Trump wrote.

North Korea lashed out at the U.S. Thursday after Vice President Mike Pence repeated Trump’s Libya threat to Pyongyang – a reference to the 2011 U.S.-backed overthrow and murder of Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi.

In a statement from North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui, Pyongyang also protested U.S. demands that it unilaterally denuclearize without concession.

“U.S. Vice-President Pence has made unbridled and impudent remarks that North Korea might end like Libya, military option for North Korea never came off the table, the U.S. needs complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization, and so on,” Son-hui said. “As a person involved in the U.S. affairs, I cannot suppress my surprise at such ignorant and stupid remarks gushing out from the mouth of the U.S. vice-president.”

Pence’s remark came after Trump, attempting to distance himself from White House National Security Advisor John Bolton, confused Bolton’s reference to the Libyan disarmament of 2003 with the NATO campaign against the country in 2011.

“The model, if you look at that model with Gaddafi, that was a total decimation. We went in there to beat them,” Trump told reporters. “Now, that model would take place if we don’t make a deal, most likely.”

Bolton’s initial comments on the “Libya model” last week began the souring relations that led to the summit’s cancellation.

North Korea’s First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Kim Kye Gwan similarly accused Bolton last Wednesday of endangering the current détente with “unbridled remarks.”

“World knows too well that our country is neither Libya nor Iraq which have met miserable fate. It is absolutely absurd to dare compare the DPRK, a nuclear weapon state, to Libya which had been at the initial stage of nuclear development,” Gwan wrote. “We shed light on the quality of Bolton already in the past, and we do not hide our feeling of repugnance towards him.”

Trump’s Thursday letter, which thanked North Korea for releasing three American hostages, also made an ominous reference to the U.S. nuclear arsenal.

“You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used,” Trump wrote.

The president also left room open for the meeting to take place at another date and time.

“If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit, please do not hesitate to call me or write,” Trump wrote.

The decision reportedly came as a surprise to some administration officials, who felt North Korea’s comments were merely posturing and that Kim still was expected to attend.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, however, said North Korea failed to respond when reached to discuss logistics for the summit.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who was unaware of the plan to cancel, called an emergency meeting in Seoul at around midnight.

Reports claimed last week that the president became uneasy about the upcoming summit after North Korea expressed disagreement with U.S. demands.

News of the cancellation comes just hours after Pyongyang announced the closure of its nuclear test site at Punggye-ri.

Speaking in the Oval Office Thursday, Trump said the U.S. military was ready “if necessary” if conditions with North Korea continued to deteriorate. </s> The Trump administration is blaming North Korea for President Donald Trump canceling his summit with Kim Jong Un, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo saying the country's recent rhetoric showed they were unprepared to meet.

"We did not walk away from this," Pompeo told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Thursday. "I regret the statements that the North Koreans have made over the past few days and the fact that we've not been able to conduct the preparation between our two teams that would be necessary to have a chance for a successful summit."

But Democrats weren't buying it, arguing the administration had mishandled the opportunity, blaming tough talk from top officials for sending the wrong message to Pyongyang.

"The art of diplomacy is a lot harder than the art of the deal," said the committee's top Democrat, Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey.

President Trump released a letter this morning, which the State Department had transmitted to North Korea and Kim Jong Un, saying he was canceling their meeting scheduled for June 12 in Singapore. He cited "the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement" and said the cancellation was "for the good of both parties, but to the detriment of the world."

North Korea had released a statement Thursday that bashed Vice President Mike Pence for "ignorant and stupid" comments, in which he cited the so-called "Libya model" for North Korea's denuclearization and said the U.S. still has the military option for solving the North Korean crisis on the table.

In 2003, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi agreed to give up his nuclear weapons in exchange for normalized relations with the U.S., but to many, including North Korea, the model includes Gaddafi's overthrow, aided by western airstrikes, and his violent death seven years later.

"We will neither beg the U.S. for dialogue nor take the trouble to persuade them if they do not want to sit together with us. Whether the U.S. will meet us at a meeting room or encounter us at nuclear-to-nuclear showdown is entirely dependent upon the decision and behavior of the United States," said Choe Son-hui, a vice foreign minister, in a statement on North Koran state television KCNA.

Trump seemed to respond directly to that threat of war in his letter, writing, "You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used."

But Pompeo, who read the letter at the top of the hearing, said plans for the summit had begun to fall apart over the few days, with the administration getting "a lot of dial tones" when reaching out to North Korea. That includes a planning meeting in Singapore last week where the North Koreans did not show up, according to a senior White House official.

"Over the past many days we have endeavored to do what Chairman Kim and I had agreed, was to put teams, preparation teams together to begin to work to prepare for the summit, and we have received no response to our inquiries from them," Pompeo said.

Democrats blamed a lack of understanding of North Korea and multiple references by Pence and National Security Adviser John Bolton to the "Libya model."

"The 'Libya model' as Kim Jong Un has been interpreting it is where leader surrenders their nuclear capability only to then be overthrown and killed," said Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. "Why would you think that there would be any other interpretation than what happened to Gaddafi at the end of his denuclearization, which is that he wound up dead? Why think that that would not, in fact, elicit hostility from a negotiating partner only three weeks from sitting down across the table?"

Pompeo rejected that argument, saying in his conversations with Kim, he made clear the U.S. would provide security assurances long after they struck a deal. Pompeo has met Kim twice, as CIA Director and Secretary of State – the highest-ranking U.S. official to do so, meeting for more than three hours in total.

Pompeo also denied that the administration did not know what it was doing, saying, "The American team is fully prepared. I think we are rockin'. I think we are ready. I think we are prepared for this meeting."

With the summit scrapped, for now, the international sanctions regime will remain in place, with the goal of getting the two leaders to sit down at some point, according to Pompeo, who said there were no signs China was violating the United Nations sanctions in any "serious" way.

But those partners in the sanctions campaign were surprised by Trump's letter and sudden cancellation, and there are questions now about whether it will crack the global pressure on North Korea. Pompeo declined to say whether the administration gave South Korea or others a heads-up.

At the White House Thursday, Trump threatened military action, saying the Pentagon "is ready if necessary," although he declined to say if the breakdown of the summit raises the risk of war.

But Pompeo said he was "still optimistic" there could be a diplomatic solution: "The diplomacy this administration has engaged in has gotten us this far. I am confident that we will move forward in a way that will continue to give us the opportunity to achieve this," he said. </s> President Donald Trump today said the US has not been notified about North Korea’s threat to cancel his historic summit with Kim Jong-un next month. North Korea has threatened to abandon planned talks between Kim and Trump in June if Washington insists on pushing it “into a corner” on nuclear disarmament. “No decision. We haven’t been notified at all (about the threat). We’ll have to see,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “We haven’t seen anything. We haven’t heard anything. We will see what happens, whatever is,” Trump told reporters as he welcomed the president of Uzbekistan to the White House.

Asked if Kim is bluffing, he replied, “We’ll see what happens.” Asked if he will still insist on the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula, Trump said, “Yes”. A statement published by the state-run Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) said North Korea would never accept economic assistance from the US in exchange for unilaterally abandoning its nuclear programme.

In the meeting on June 12 in Singapore, the two countries were expected to discuss ways to implement their leaders’ recent agreements to reduce military tensions along their heavily fortified border and improve their overall ties.

Reacting to the reports from Pyongyang, the White House earlier said it was “still hopeful” the summit will proceed despite North Korea’s threat to cancel it. The State Department also said it was going ahead with preparations for the summit as planned earlier.
North Korea warns that it might cancel talks with the United States if the U.S. keeps insisting that North Korea will "unilaterally" abandon its nuclear weapons program, similar to the disarmament of Libya. The White House says it is hopeful the planned summit will still happen.