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N. Korea’s Kim asked China’s Xi to help lift sanctions: report
TOKYO, July 1, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has
appealed to China’s Xi Jinping to help end sanctions against Pyongyang
following his landmark summit with US President Donald Trump, a Japanese
newspaper reported Sunday, citing multiple unnamed sources in the two
countries.
Kim made the request during his third meeting with Xi in Beijing last
month, and the Chinese president promised to do his “utmost” to satisfy it,
the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper said.
“We are feeling great pain due to economic sanctions. Now that we have
concluded the US-North Korea summit in success, I want (China) to work toward
early lifting of the sanctions,” Kim reportedly told Xi, according to the
newspaper.
In recent months the Cold War-era allies have sought to repair ties
strained by Pyongyang’s nuclear tests and Beijing’s support of subsequent UN
sanctions.
Kim chose Beijing — his main economic patron and diplomatic protector —
for his first official foreign trip in March and met Xi again in May in the
northeastern port city of Dalian.
Kim asked Xi to help ease the sanctions that have crippled North Korea’s
economy, and urged China to back Pyongyang in its denuclearisation talks with
Washington, the report said.
Xi in turn told Kim he “actively supports North Korea’s reform and
opening-up and will proactively cooperate with issues associated with the
efforts”, according to the Yomiuri.
He also urged North Korea to “continue (its) consultations with China” as
it negotiates with the United States, the report said.
China indicated last year that the UN Security Council could consider
easing the punitive measures against Pyongyang.
Kim’s third official visit to China was seen as a move to reassure Beijing
that Pyongyang would not neglect its interests after the historic summit with
Trump in Singapore.
China and the US both hope to see the Korean peninsula free of nuclear
weapons.
But Beijing is concerned Washington and Pyongyang might move closer at its
expense, a possibility that China sees as threatening to its economic and
security interests in the region.
BSS/AFP/GMR/1407 hrs