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Why U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean Chairman Kim Jong-un have agreed to select Vietnam for their second nuclear summit on next Feb. 27-28, 2019

February 08, 2019
US President Donald Trump and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un shake hands after signing documents during the US-North Korea summit at the Capella Hotel on the resort island of Sentosa, Singapore on June 12.(REUTERS)
President Donald Trump gives a thumbs-up after arriving on Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Friday, Feb. 8, 2019. The President was returning to the White House after his annual physical exam at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
VietPress USA (Feb. 8, 2019): US President Donald Trump has announced in his State of the Union speech that he will hold a second nuclear summit with North Korea's leader this month.
President Trump said in his 82-minute speech on last Tuesday night, Feb. 5th 2019 that he would meet Kim Jong-un in Vietnam from 27-28 February.
"Much work remains to be done," Trump said, "but my relationship with Kim Jong-un is a good one.” Plans for a second summit have been in the works since the two leaders' historic talks last year on June 12th 2018 in Singapore as the first time ever between a sitting US president and a North Korean leader to meet face-to-face in a historic US-North Korea summit that could lead to peace between the two countries that have technically been at war for 68 years or end in new recriminations. 

The two leaders warmly shook hands for around 13 seconds in front of a row of alternating US and North Korean flags. They then moved into a roughly 40-minute one-on-one meeting, joined only by their interpreters before including their advisers for bilateral talks and a working lunch. 

Trump and Kim concluded the extraordinary US-North Korea summit by signing a “comprehensive” document in which the US president pledged “security guarantees” to the North and Kim reiterated his commitment to “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.” 

Pyongyang has not conducted any atomic or ballistic missile tests since last summer, but until now it has yet to agree to dismantle its nuclear weapons programme.
Today on Friday, Feb. 8th 2019, President Trump tweeted to announce his second summit with Kim Jong-un in Viet Nam and said that his representatives had just left North Korea after a "productive meeting" for preparing the Feb. 27-28 summit. The US envoy for North Korea, Stephen Biegun, was in Pyongyang for talks, paving the way for the second leadership summit. 

The president had previously announced Vietnam as the summit location, but the city hadn't been identified, but people think that the summit location could by Hanoi capitol or Da Nang city in central of Vietnam. 

There are 5 main reasons that both US and North Korea agree to hold the second summit in Vietnam: 
1- The host city hasn’t yet been disclosed, but one option is Vietnam’s capital, Hanoi, which lies 1,700 miles from Pyongyang, North Korea. That’s closer than Chicago is to Los Angeles, and it means an even shorter flight for Kim than the one he took to Singapore and this is safe for Kim to use his old Soviet-made airplane for his trip. Last time 

Kim flew to Singapore aboard an Air China jet loaned by Beijing.

2- The flight from North Korea to Vietnam would cross only friendly Chinese airspace, making Kim feel even safer. On the ground, the North Korean leader would step into the tight-if-not-quite-suffocating embrace of another one-party state.

Vietnamese authorities exercise significant control over dissent, public demonstrations and the media. A recent anti-corruption crackdown ensnared high-level officials in the Communist Party and at state-owned companies, but drew comparisons to a Chinese-style political purge.

Another possible venue is the coastal city of Da Nang, which has hosted major summits and where warships could be positioned to offer added security for US President.

The Vietnamese public is broadly enthusiastic about playing host to Trump and Kim, and no one expects any protests or other disturbances to mar the summit.

3- The U.S. and Vietnam share a bloody history, but the relationship has moved far beyond the 20-year war that ended in 1975 and claimed the lives of 58,000 U.S. soldiers and an estimated 3 million Vietnamese troops and civilians.

Since President Clinton normalized relations with Vietnam in 1995, the countries have developed close economic and military ties, centered in part on shared concerns over China’s trade practices and its advances in the South China Sea.

Bilateral trade jumped from $451 million in 1995 to nearly $52 billion in 2016. The Pentagon conducts an annual high-level dialogue with Vietnamese counterparts, and last year Vietnam participated for the first time in the U.S.-led “Rim of the Pacific,” the world’s largest international maritime exercise.

4- A decade after the “American War” ended, as the Vietnam War is known there, the Southeast Asian nation was internationally isolated and starving, a Stalinist experiment in collectivization having left farmers starving and store shelves barren.

In 1986, Hanoi’s leadership began the Doi Moi program of liberalization that reopened the country to the world and produced one of the most stunning economic turnarounds in recent times.

Vietnam’s economy is expanding by 6% to 7% a year, with bustling small businesses, thriving manufacturing zones and a glittering skyline in Ho Chi Minh City, the former Saigon. 

The country’s communist leaders have embraced the summit as a chance to advertise itself on the world stage.

The U.S. hasn’t exactly been subtle about the lessons it sees for Kim, who has talked of developing his country’s centralized economy. Last year, Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo used a speech to business leaders in Hanoi to address Kim directly, saying: “This miracle can be yours.”

State Department spokesman Robert Palladino said Vietnam shows “the possibilities for peace and prosperity,” and that the Trump administration is hoping Kim will see it as a model of the kind of growth that can come with more economic flexibility, if not necessarily more political freedom.

5- From bitter enemies to trusted partners, the trajectory of the U.S.-Vietnam relationship could excite a young North Korean leader who is said to be enamored of Western culture.

The rapprochement with Vietnam began slowly, with bilateral efforts to account for prisoners of war. It has expanded to cooperation in repatriating the remains of U.S. service members and cleaning up remnants of Agent Orange, the toxic defoliant sprayed by U.S. warplanes over large swaths of northern Vietnam during the war.

Cultural ties have also grown rapidly. Vietnam is one of the largest sources of foreign students to the United States, sending more than 20,000 annually.

Palladino said Vietnam had become a “close friend and partner” of the United States and shows "the possibilities for peace and prosperity" to North Korea.



VietPress USA News

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Trump says summit with North Korea's Kim will be in Hanoi





WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Friday that he will hold his second summit with North Korea's Kim Jong Un in Hanoi and predicted that the authoritarian country would someday become "a great Economic Powerhouse" under Kim's leadership.
In a pair of tweets, Trump praised Kim and said his representatives had just left North Korea after a "productive meeting" on the Feb. 27-28 summit.
Trump added, "I look forward to seeing Chairman Kim & advancing the cause of peace!"
The president had previously announced Vietnam as the summit location, but the city hadn't been identified. It will be the pair's second summit, the first coming last June in Singapore. Kim pledged then to work toward the "complete denuclearization" of the Korean Peninsula, without providing a clear timetable or roadmap.
While in Asia, Stephen Biegun, the U.S. special representative for North Korea, is thought to have discussed specific disarmament steps that Pyongyang could promise at the Vietnam summit and what corresponding measures the United States is willing to take.
In announcing the location of their second meeting, Trump showered praise on Kim, whom he used to derisively call "Little Rocket Man." Months after their Singapore summit, Trump said that Kim had written him "beautiful letters" and that the two "fell in love."
"North Korea, under the leadership of Kim Jong Un, will become a great Economic Powerhouse. He may surprise some but he won't surprise me, because I have gotten to know him & fully understand how capable he is. North Korea will become a different kind of Rocket - an Economic one!" Trump tweeted Friday.
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