Some experts have suggested Kim is likely to use Thursday’s talks to try to convince Putin to allow the thousands of North Korean workers in Russia to stay.
Washington has said it believes the 100,000 North Korean laborers abroad — including some 30,000 in Russia — contribute more than $500 million a year to Pyongyang’s economy. Under current U.N. sanctions, all of those workers must return to North Korea by the end of 2019.
According to Seaman, that issue may be an area where the U.S. will offer some lenience to North Korea to move talks forward.
“Another twist to this story were some comments that Secretary of State (Mike) Pompeo made a couple of weeks ago, where he reiterated the strong U.S. stance — the need to keep sanctions in place until North Korea shows that it is very ready to denuclearize,” Seaman said.
“But at the same time, he made a comment about North Korean workers abroad — perhaps, at least, some people interpret that to suggest that there might be some wiggle room,” he added. “That might be an area where the U.S. would offer some additional flexibility that would help the talks maybe move a step forward.”
—Reuters contributed to this report.
from Viral News Reports http://bit.ly/2UCg0sv
0 Comments