In a televised new year speech, he said the entire US was within range of North Korean nuclear weapons, adding: “This is reality, not a threat.”

But he also offered a potential olive branch to South Korea, suggesting he was “open to dialogue”.

North Korea may also send a team to the Winter Olympics in Seoul, he said.

What is President Trump’s reaction?

When asked by reporters to respond to Mr Kim’s latest threats, US President Donald Trump said, “We’ll see, we’ll see”.

He was speaking at the sidelines of New Year’s Eve celebrations at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

North Korea has come under increased criticism and sanctions over the past year because of its nuclear weapons programme and repeated testing of conventional missiles.

North Korea has come under increased criticism and sanctions over the past year because of its nuclear weapons programme and repeated testing of conventional missiles.

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He took to Twitter to complain he would never call North Korean leader Kim Jong-un “short and fat”, after its foreign ministry called him “old”.

It was one of a series of remarks he made on social media before volunteering his services over maritime claims in the South China Sea.

“I’m a very good mediator,” he said.

China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei all have competing claims to territory in the South China Sea.

Tensions with China have been high in both Vietnam and the Philippines, inflamed by the formers island-building and naval patrols.

A framework for a code of conduct was agreed in August, but this is still only an outline, with more negotiations due to take place before it can be legally binding.

Mr Trump, who has long styled himself as a dealmaker, suggested his expertise could aid the process.

“If I can help mediate or arbitrate, please let me know,” Mr Trump told his Vietnamese counterpart, Tran Dai Quang, at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Hanoi.

Mr Trump’s own dispute with North Korea continues to escalate, at least in the insults traded across Twitter and in official statements.

On Saturday, North Korea denounced Mr Trump’s Asia trip, calling it a “warmonger’s visit” and again described the president as a “dotard” – a centuries-old insult for an elderly person.

Mr Trump responded with a passive aggressive tweet, suggesting he would never call Mr Kim was “short and fat”, and complaining: “Oh well, I try so hard to be his friend – and maybe someday that will happen!”

The president also tweeted out a short tirade over criticism of his handling of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Mr Trump told reporters on Saturday that he trusted the Russian leader’s word that Russia had not attempted to interfere with the US election, despite a consensus among US intelligence agencies to the contrary.

“When will all the haters and fools out there realize that having a good relationship with Russia is a good thing, not a bad thing,” the president wrote.

“There [sic] always playing politics – bad for our country. I want to solve North Korea, Syria, Ukraine, terrorism, and Russia can greatly help!” he added.

He later clarified, after intense criticism, that he supported US intelligence agencies in their conclusion. “As to whether or not I believe it or not, I’m with our agencies. I believe in our… intelligence agencies,” he said.

“What he believes, he believes,” he added, of Mr Putin’s belief that Russia did not meddle.

Asked at a news conference in Vietnam if he could see himself being friends with Mr Kim, the president said: “That might be a strange thing to happen but it’s a possibility.

“If it did happen it could be a good thing I can tell you for North Korea, but it could also be good for a lot of other places and be good for the rest the world.

“It could be something that could happen. I don’t know if it will but it would be very, very nice.”

The Vietnamese leg of Mr Trump’s five-nation Asia tour was met with protests. Mai Khoi, a singer and dissident, said police confined her to her home and threatened her with eviction, after she defied a ban on protests.

Ms Khoi, who was barred from standing for parliament last year, said she was escorted home after she flashed a sign insulting the president as his motorcade passed by.

She said she was protesting against Donald Trump’s attitude to women and his failure to meet with human rights activists in Vietnam.

Mr Trump will travel to Manila later on Sunday for the final stop on his Asia tour, before flying back to the US.

–

Source: BBC

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Pyongyang said the ‘entire US mainland is within our firing range’ and threatened ‘severe punishment’ for America if it ‘dares to invade out sacred territory’.

The chilling statement comes as a North Korean official claimed the secretive nation was building a rocket capable of traveling more than 6,000 miles.

The new missile would be capable of reaching ‘all the way to the East coast’ of the US, one of Kim Jong-un’s officials claimed.

The official told CNN Pyongyang was not ruling out diplomacy, but that beforehand, ‘we want to send a clear message that the DPRK has a reliable defensive and offensive capability to counter any aggression from the United States’.

It comes after North Korea’s deputy UN ambassador warned yesterday that the situation on the Korean peninsula ‘has reached the touch-and-go point and a nuclear war may break out any moment.’

Kim In Ryong told the U.N. General Assembly’s disarmament committee that North Korea is the only country in the world that has been subjected to ‘such an extreme and direct nuclear threat’ from the United States since the 1970s – and said the country has the right to possess nuclear weapons in self-defense.

He pointed to large-scale military exercises every year using ‘nuclear assets’ and said what is more dangerous is what he called a US plan to stage a ‘secret operation aimed at the removal of our supreme leadership.’

This year, Kim said, North Korea completed its ‘state nuclear force and thus became the full-fledged nuclear power which possesses the delivery means of various ranges, including the atomic bomb, H-bomb and intercontinental ballistic rockets.’

‘The entire US mainland is within our firing range and if the US dares to invade our sacred territory even an inch it will not escape our severe punishment in any part of the globe,’ he warned.

Kim’s speech follows escalating threats between North Korea and the United States, and increasingly tough UN sanctions.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Monday that his country is curtailing economic, scientific and other ties with North Korea in line with UN sanctions, and the European Union announced new sanctions on Pyongyang for developing nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Sunday that diplomatic efforts aimed at resolving the North Korean crisis ‘will continue until the first bomb drops.’

His commitment to diplomacy came despite President Donald Trump’s tweets several weeks ago that his chief envoy was ‘wasting his time’ trying to negotiate with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, whom he derisively referred to as ‘Little Rocket Man.’

North Korea’s deputy UN ambassador called his country’s nuclear and missile arsenal ‘a precious strategic asset that cannot be reversed or bartered for anything.’

‘Unless the hostile policy and the nuclear threat of the US is thoroughly eradicated, we will never put our nuclear weapons and ballistic rockets on the negotiating table under any circumstances,’ Kim said.

He told the disarmament committee that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea – North Korea’s official name – had hoped for a nuclear-free world.

Instead, Kim said, all nuclear states are accelerating the modernisation of their weapons and ‘reviving a nuclear arms race reminiscent of (the) Cold War era.’

He noted that the nuclear weapon states, including the United States, boycotted negotiations for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons that was approved in July by 122 countries at the United Nations.

‘The DPRK consistently supports the total elimination of nuclear weapons and the efforts for denuclearisation of the entire world,’ he said. But as long as the United States rejects the treaty and ‘constantly threatens and blackmails the DPRK with nuclear weapons … the DPRK is not in position to accede to the treaty.’

–

Source: Daily Mail

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“Save your energy Rex, we’ll do what has to be done!” Mr Trump tweeted, after it emerged the US had lines of communication with Pyongyang.

Rex Tillerson disclosed the development on Saturday, saying North Korea had no interest in dialogue.

The two countries have engaged in heated rhetoric in recent months.

The US wants North Korea to halt its weapons programme, which has seen it perform repeated missile tests and, on 3 September, the test of a miniaturised hydrogen bomb which could be loaded on to a long-range missile, which Pyongyang said was successful.

But attempts at dialogue seem to be at odds with President Donald Trump’s own attitude to the issue.

On Sunday, he tweeted, in reference to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un: “I told Rex Tillerson, our wonderful Secretary of State, that he is wasting his time trying to negotiate with Little Rocket Man…”

He then added: “…Save your energy Rex, we’ll do what has to be done!”

His comments come a day after Mr Tillerson revealed that US officials had some communication channels open with Pyongyang, despite the escalating war of words between the leaders of both countries.

Asked whether North Korea would come to the negotiating table, the secretary of state said: “We are probing, so stay tuned.”

However, he later acknowledged that little progress had been made.

–

Source: BBC

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The draft resolution circulated to the Security Council members comes after North Korea’s sixth nuclear test and repeated missile launches.

Pyongyang also claims to have developed a hydrogen bomb and continues to threaten to strike the US.
China and Russia are both expected to oppose further sanctions.

North Korea is already under highly restrictive sanctions imposed by the UN that are intended to force the leadership to curtail its weapons programmes.

In August, a new round of sanctions banned exports including coal, costing North Korea an estimated $1bn (£767m) – about a third of its entire export economy.

But some trade avenues remain open to it.

The draft US proposal calls for a total ban on supplying a range of oil products to North Korea and a ban on its textile export industry.

It also suggests freezing the assets of Mr Kim and the North Korean government, as well as banning him and other senior officials from travelling.
North Korean labourers would also be banned from working abroad, principally in Russia’s Far East and China.
Remittances from foreign earnings and textile exports are two of the most important remaining sources of income for North Korea.

But it is not clear how China and Russia, which both supply oil to North Korea and wield vetoes at the Security Council, will respond to the US move.

On Thursday, China’s foreign minister Wang Yi told reporters that the council should respond further “by taking necessary measures”, but did not elaborate.

He added that “sanctions and pressure are only half of the key to resolving the issue. The other half is dialogue and negotiation.”

China is both North Korea’s and the US’s biggest trade partner, and has supported recent sanctions against it.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has argued that the amount of oil his country exports to North Korea – some 40,000 tonnes – is negligible.

“It is not worth giving in to emotions and driving North Korea into a corner,” he said.
Both China and Russia have been pushing for an alternative solution.

They are proposing that the US and ally South Korea stop their military drills – which anger the North – and end the deployment of the controversial anti-missile Thaad system in South Korea, in return for Pyongyang ceasing its nuclear and missile programme.

The proposal has been rejected by the US and South Korea.

On Thursday, the South’s military announced it had completed the deployment of Thaad, reported Yonhap news agency.

President Moon Jae-in also met with Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, where both agreed to push for greater sanctions. Mr Abe called for “the greatest possible pressure” to be put on North Korea.

US President Donald Trump had previously warned the US could cut off trade with countries that do business with North Korea.

The US has indicated that if the resolution is not passed when the Security Council meets next Monday it may impose its own sanctions unilaterally.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin told reporters on Wednesday night: “We believe that we need to economically cut off North Korea.

“I have an executive order prepared. It’s ready to go to the president. It will authorise me to… put sanctions on anybody that does trade with North Korea.”

Mr Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping also discussed North Korea over the phone on Wednesday, where they agreed to “take further action”, said a White House statement.

The US president, who has previously threatened a military response to North Korea, told reporters this was was “not our first choice”, but did not rule it out.

Mr Trump added: “President Xi would like to do something. We’ll see whether or not he can do it. But we will not be putting up with what’s happening in North Korea.”

Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported that Mr Xi called for a “peaceful settlement of the issue” involving “dialogue combined with a set of comprehensive measures”.

–

Source: BBC

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Kim Hak-song worked at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) and was held on 6 May, state-run news agency KCNA said.

Three other US citizens are currently held in North Korea, including Kim Sang-duck, who had taught at PUST.

The US has in the past accused North Korea of detaining its citizens to use them as pawns.

KCNA said that “a relevant institution” was “conducting [a] detailed investigation” into Kim Hak-song’s alleged crimes.

It gave no further details.

A State Department official said Washington was “aware of reports that a US citizen was detained in North Korea”, adding it would liaise with the Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang, which helps look after US interests in North Korea.

Kim Hak-song had previously described himself as a Christian missionary who intended to start an experimental farm at PUST, Reuters news agency reported, citing an online post by Mr Kim.

PUST is a university that mostly teaches the children of North Korea’s elite.

It was founded in 2010 by a Korean-American Christian entrepreneur, with much of the costs funded by US and South Korea Christian charities.

Several foreign lecturers are thought to teach at the university.

The detention comes amid heightened tensions between North Korea and the US.

Pyongyang has threatened to carry out a new nuclear test – while the US has sent a warship to the region and vowed to stop the North from developing nuclear weapons.

On Friday, North Korea accused US and South Korean agents of plotting to kill its Supreme Leader, Kim Jong-un.

The US and South Korean governments did not comment on the allegations, but experts were sceptical about the claim.

Kim Hak-song’s arrest makes him the fourth US citizen to be held by Pyongyang.

The other US detainees are:

• Kim Sang-duck, a lecturer who taught at PUST and was detained in April for allegedly attempting to “overturn” the government. South Korean media said he was 55 and had been involved in humanitarian work in the North
• Kim Dong-chul, 62, who was sentenced to 10 years’ hard labour for spying last year.
• Student Otto Warmbier, 22, who was sentenced to 15 years’ hard labour for trying to steal a propaganda sign from a hotel

–

Source: BBC

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Switzerland coach Ottmar Hitzfeld says Ghana can win the 2014 World Cup if they are consistent with their performances.

The most successful German trainer of all time is in Ghana to provide star quality for the launch of sports website, AllSports.

 “I think Ghana can become world champions. What’s important is that the performance has to be consistent throughout,” Hitzfeld said on Tuesday.

The Bayern Munich legend fleshed out swollen-headedness as a big problem, feeling that the lack of hunger when the team scales the knock-out phase remains an issue

 When you surprise or pull an upset, the emotions are very high because you feel you have done something special, and that can derail your focus. But such achievements are only the beginning,” he explained.

 “To teams or countries that want to become world champions, such achievements are seen as normal because they have their eyes on the ultimate.”

 Hitzfield, who firmly backs his country to win the World Cup, says Ghana will have it tough in June together with Portugal and the United States in the same group.

 By: Gary Al-Smth/Citifmonline.com/Ghana

Follow @garyalsmith

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