Over the past month, Joe Biden’s administration has been trying to reach out to North Korea through several different channels, but to no avail. A senior administration official told CNN that to reduce the risk of escalation, they reached out to North Korea through several channels starting in February, including in New York through its mission in the United Nations. The senior official said that “to date, we have not received any response from Pyongyang.”
The senior official also added that the US and North Korea have not had any active dialogue for over a year.
The reports did not give any details about the implications of the attempts to contact North Korea, nor what level and or type of relationship the Biden administration wants to have with the Asian country.
The White House official told CNN that the new administration is evaluating it’s political stance and relationship with North Korea. This includes “evaluating all available options to address the growing threat North Korea poses to its neighbors and international community.”
So far, President Biden has not shared his policy regarding North Korea.
This is big contrast to Biden’s predecessor, President Donald Trump, who broke with decades of American tradition to become the first US sitting President to meet North Korea’s leader. During Trump’s tenure, he met with the Asian leader three times; once in the Demilitarized Zone between the two Koreas, once in Singapore, and once in Vietnam. The meeting in the Demilitarized Zone was the President’s idea, which his top advisors said caught them by surprise.
The meetings were aimed at reining in North Korea’s nuclear weapon program, and to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula; and even though the meetings didn’t result in the intended goals, they did result in a stable relationship between the countries. Now it seems, North Korea is not interested in hearing what this new administration has to say.
