North Korea will funnel anything it can to gain from talks with South Korea into its nuclear arsenal or military, Representative Ed Royce warned.
Speaking to Fox News, the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee said President Donald Trump must keep “pressure” on the secretive state.
He said: “I think it’s very important we keep the pressure up.
“Look if the talks are going on during the Olympic Games in February maybe that quiets the neighbourhood there for a bit.”
North Korea has refused to give up developing its military arsenal despite the UN decision to hit the regime with a new series of sanctions targeting Pyongyang’s economy and trade.
Rep. Royce said he was concerned that if South Korea concede even a little bit during talks with Kim Jong-un, the rogue state’s leader will channel the resources into his nuclear arsenal.
He said: “But my main concern is that South Korea not give away anything such as resources or money to North Korea in any of these talks.
“Why? Because the money always finds its way back into their nuclear weapons programme.
“Virtually 100 percent of whatever gets into the hands of Kim Jong-un is deployed for his military or his ICBM and nuclear weapons programme.
“That’s why we’ve got to be so careful in not allowing resources to be transferred to that regime.”
It comes after North Korea accepted an invitation from Seoul to resume peace talks with South Korea in ground-breaking high-level talks ahead of the 2018 Winter Olympics.
The warring neighbours resumed communications for the first time since 2016 this week in a telephone exchange.