Seoul, Feb 12 (AFP) Vietnam''s foreign minister arrived in North Korea on Tuesday, Pyongyang''s state media said, ahead of a second scheduled summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un. With the high-stakes meeting now two weeks away, Pyongyang has yet to provide any official confirmation of the meeting in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi.
"A delegation of the Vietnamese Foreign Ministry led by Pham Binh Minh, deputy prime minister of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, arrived here on Tuesday," the official KCNA news agency said, without expanding. Trump announced last week that Hanoi will be the host for a second summit with the North Korean leader on February 27-28, following their landmark first meeting in Singapore last year.
That summit produced a vaguely-worded document in which Kim pledged to work towards denuclearisation -- with no hard timelines agreed. Vietnam''s Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh said on Monday he "will pay an official visit to DPRK from February 12 to 14" at the invitation of his North Korean counterpart Ri Yong Ho.
No further details were provided for the visit, but ministry spokeswoman Le Thi Thu Hang said last week Vietnam is "willing to make positive contributions... for a successful US-North Korea summit".
|