East Asia

President Donald Trump has accepted an invitation to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un by May, setting in motion the most significant development in years of intermittent negotiations about North Korea's nuclear weapons program, reports CNBC. 

South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in said yesteday sanctions on North Korea will not be eased for the sake of a summit with Pyongyang, but China’s state media warned nuclear North Korea will not be intimidated and that talks were the only solution.

North and South Korea will hold their first summit in more than a decade in late April, the South's presidential office said on Tuesday after a senior delegation returned from a visit to the North where they met leader Kim Jong Un, according to Reuters. 

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met senior South Korean government officials for the first time and said it is his “firm will to vigorously advance” inter-Korean ties and pursue reunification, the North’s official news agency said on March 5.

North Korea should abandon its nuclear-ballistic programs and allow peace to take root in the Korean Peninsula, South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said, quoted by Reuters.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in urged the United States to “lower the threshold for talks” with North Korea on Feb. 26 as his aides held rare talks with a Pyongyang general on ways to defuse tensions.

North Korea on Sunday accused the United States of trying to undermine an improvement in inter-Korean relations, while South Korean protesters tried to block senior North Korean officials on their way to the Pyeongchang Winter Games closing ceremony, Reuters reported.

The United States is due to announce its largest package of sanctions yet against North Korea to further pressure Pyongyang over its nuclear and missile program, as South Korea readies itself for more talks with the North's officials, reported Reuters.

Collaborations between Japanese and Turkish firms in third countries, especially in Africa, could bring success, since the two countries complement each other, a Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) senior official said on Feb. 20.

A historic meeting between the United States and North Korea was planned at the Winter Olympics, but Pyongyang canceled it at the last minute, the White House said in a statement, cited by the Guardian. That would have been the first high-level meeting between the Donald Trump administration and Pyongyang.