U.S. President Joe Biden and South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Friday expressed a desire to engage North Korea in diplomacy in trying to reduce tensions over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.
“We both are deeply concerned about the situation,” Biden said at the start of a joint news conference with Moon, the second foreign leader to visit the White House since Biden took office.
Biden said the two countries will have a “shared approach” to North Korea and that he and Moon shared a willingness to engage diplomatically with the North “to take pragmatic steps to reduce tensions.”
South Korean President Moon Jae-in walks with U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to the Rayburn room following their meeting in her office at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., U.S. May 20, 2021. REUTERS/Ken Cedeno
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Biden said a State Department official, Sung Kim, would serve as a special U.S. envoy for North Korea. Moon said the envoy would help explore whether North Korea is willing to engage diplomatically and he hoped for a positive response from Pyongyang.
North Korea thus far has rebuffed U.S. entreaties for diplomacy since Biden took over from then-President Donald Trump, who held three summits with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Moon welcomed what he called Biden’s realistic, pragmatic approach to North Korea and called denuclearization a top priority.
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