Call for inter-Korean talks as tensions ease

Steve Bannon, the White House’s chief strategist, told The American Prospect that there was no military solution to Pyongyang’s nuclear threat.

“As the United States launched full-scale provocation against the DPRK across all fields of politics, economy and military, nothing can alter the will and resolve of the army and people of the DPRK to respond by taking resolute retaliatory measures”, Kim said.

It can be recalled that earlier this week, North Korean state media KCNA reported that Kim Jong Un postponed his plans to fire missiles on a trajectory of Guam after reviewing the matter.

When I asked the governor if he thought the comment was flippant in the face of a possible nuclear war, he said: ‘I didn’t take it as an insult.

Guam in the firing line?

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson stressed after security talks with close ally Japan that the US seeks a peaceful solution to the standoff over North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

But afterward, according to KCNA, he chose to postpone the operation to “watch a little more the foolish and stupid conduct of the Yankees” and not to go ahead unless the U.S. commits more “reckless actions”.

The U.S. has been counting on China to mount pressure on its neighbor and ally, North Korea, to have a rethink on its quest to acquire nuclear weapons.

Tillerson spoke after he and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis held annual security talks with Japanese Defense Minister Itsunori Onodera and Foreign Minister Taro Kono at the State Department.

He almost got them to stop trying to make nuclear bombs when he was there in 1990s.

The official daily Rodong Sinmun criticised the South Korean leader, who in a Tuesday speech asserted that Seoul’s “big challenge at present” was the “issue of North’s nukes and missile”.

North Korea knows that without help from China it would be doomed if it begins a shootout.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in declared there would be no second war on the Korean Peninsula amid fears that heightened animosity could lead to real fighting.

Tillerson reiterates that Pyongyang must show it is serious about denuclearizationUS Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on August 15 that he plans to continue working toward bilateral dialogue to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, but called for a change in behavior first from Pyongyang. U.S. President Donald Trump “also said whatever option he would use, he would fully discuss it with South Korea and seek its consent beforehand”. “North Korea is nearing the red line”, he said without elaborating on the consequences of crossing it.

Mattis said that the path of provocations and threats chosen by North Korea was not in the best interests of any nation. “I want to warn North Korea to do no more unsafe gambling”, added Moon.

What worries him is a situation where North Korea feels it’s about to be attacked and worries it can’t win a war.

The president reiterated that the North Korean leader has made a “very wise and well-reasoned decision”, adding that the aftermath of such threats would have been “catastrophic and unacceptable”.

China is North Korea’s main economic partner and political backer, although relations between the two countries have deteriorated amid the North’s continuing defiance of China’s calls for restraint.

“The drill will definitely provoke Pyongyang more, and Pyongyang is expected to make a more radical response”, it said in an editorial.

Tensions have soared on the peninsula in recent months, with Pyongyang carrying out its first successful tests of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), bringing much of the USA within range.