What will Kim Jong-un's New Year message be?
(Baonghean.vn) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-un may announce the suspension of nuclear negotiations with the US in his New Year's Message if the two sides do not make any significant progress before the end of 2019. This is the announcement just revealed by an official of the South Korean Ministry of Unification.
Kim Jong-un traditionally delivers a New Year's speech on New Year's Day, in which he outlines the country's domestic and foreign policy priorities.
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| Mr. Kim Jong-un reads the New Year's Message 2019. Photo: Daily Herald |
Kim Jong-un's message for 2020 is highly anticipated, amid increasingly tense relations between the US and North Korea. North Korea has warned it will resume long-range ballistic missile testing if denuclearization talks with the US do not progress.
According to an official from the South Korean Unification Ministry, if there is no progress in negotiations between the US and North Korea between now and the end of the year, it is likely that Mr. Kim Jong-un will officially announce the suspension of negotiations between the two sides in his upcoming New Year's Message.
North Korea has previously conducted a missile engine test at a site it had said it would dismantle, putting pressure on the US to come up with a new proposal before the end of the year to break the deadlock between the two sides.
Analysts say that up to this point, North Korea is still maintaining a strategy of restraint to avoid pushing the situation to extreme confrontation in order to seek opportunities for dialogue with the US.
But US Special Representative for North Korea Stephen Biegun has said the US does not accept the deadline imposed by North Korea.
Decisions on relations with the US are likely to be made at a meeting of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea later this month, before Kim Jong-un delivers his New Year's speech.
