US President Donald Trump has reaffirmed his plan to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un by the end of May during a call with South Korea's president, voicing "cautious optimism" over recent developments, the White House says.
Trump and President Moon Jae-in discussed preparations for their upcoming engagements with North Korea and agreed that "concrete actions" were the key to achieving denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula, the White House said in a statement on Friday.
"The two leaders expressed cautious optimism over recent developments and emphasised that a brighter future is available for North Korea, if it chooses the correct path," the White House said.
South Korea said on Friday it was seeking high-level talks this month with North Korea to prepare for a summit and that South Korean President Moon Jae-in may meet Donald Trump before the US president's planned meeting with the North Korean leader.
Earlier, Moon's chief of staff, Im Jong-seok, said proposed North-South talks in late March would cover key agenda topics and other details of the pending summit between Moon and Kim.
If North Korea agrees to the talks, they would offer an opportunity for Pyongyang to break its silence on what Seoul says is Kim's desire to meet Trump and Moon and his willingness to freeze his country's nuclear and missile programs.
"We've decided to narrow down the agenda topics to denuclearising the Korean peninsula, securing permanent peace to ease military tension and new, bold ways to take inter-Korean relations forward," Im, the head of South Korea's summit preparation team, told reporters.
Im said Moon may meet Trump after an inter-Korean summit but before Trump's planned summit with Kim in May.
South Korea's Yonhap news agency said Moon pledged in the call with Trump to co-operate closely with Washington on summit diplomacy. Trump asked South Korean officials to show flexibility in trade negotiations with the US in the call, the South Korean presidency said.
Even amid North Korea tensions, Trump has repeatedly denounced a US free trade deal with ally South Korea as "unfair" and threatened many times to scrap it.
