NORTH KOREA/NUCLEAR/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/VIETNAM: “President Donald Trump acknowledged Thursday [2-28-19] that North Korea is not ready to wind down its nuclear weapons program, telling Fox News’ Sean Hannity that he understands how much work the country has put into its arsenal. Trump spoke with Hannity after two days of meetings on denuclearization with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Vietnam. Trump cut short that summit on Thursday after it became clear no deal could be reached..Trump said in a news conference after the summit that Kim demanded total relief from sanctions in exchange for incremental steps toward denuclearization, something to which Trump was unwilling to agree…Even in walking away from a deal in Hanoi, Trump signaled that his personal relationship with Kim had affected his thinking on U.S. policy toward North Korea. Asked by a reporter from South Korea if he planned on heaping more sanctions on North Korea to pressure Kim back to the negotiating table, the president said that he was seeing things from a new perspective.”
–Caitlin Oprysko, “Trump: I ‘fully’ understand why North Korea wouldn’t denuclearize,” Politico, February 28, 2019 6:38 am