"Trilateral Meeting on North Korea by South Korea, US, and Japan Officials Under Discussion to be Held in South Korea This Month"

Kyodo News "Sung Kim, US Special Representative for North Korea, Scheduled to Visit Korea from 19th to 24th"

Special Representative for North Korea Affairs Sung Kim / Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

[Asia Economy Reporter Jeong Dong-hoon] It has been reported that a meeting of senior officials responsible for North Korea policy from South Korea, the United States, and Japan may be held in South Korea later this month.

On the 16th, major Japanese media outlets including Kyodo News reported that U.S. Special Representative for North Korea Policy Sung Kim is scheduled to visit South Korea from the 19th to the 24th. Kyodo News stated that taking advantage of Kim's visit, a trilateral meeting of senior officials responsible for North Korea policy from South Korea, the U.S., and Japan is being promoted, with Noh Kyu-duk, Director General for Korean Peninsula Peace and Security Affairs at the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Takehiro Funakoshi, Director of the Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau at the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, participating together.

The Biden administration has been requesting dialogue with North Korea to discuss denuclearization, but this has not been realized. It is expected that countermeasures related to this will be reviewed at the upcoming trilateral meeting.

Special Representative Kim played a coordinating role in advance of the first North Korea-U.S. summit held in Singapore in June 2018 between former U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un.