HONG KONG — Ever since President Trump announced in his State of the Union address that he would be traveling to Vietnam this week for a second summit meeting with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, journalists around the world have been scrambling to book their flights and hotel rooms. Vietnamese officials, too, have been working hard to set up facilities where thousands of visiting reporters can easily tap on laptops, upload video footage and record voice-overs. But just as Mr. Kim’s armored train arrived at Vietnam’s northern border on Tuesday morning, the Foreign Ministry abruptly announced that it was relocating the “American Media Center” from the Meliá Hotel in central Hanoi, the capital, to a nearby building. It turned out that Mr. Kim himself would be staying at the Meliá — and presumably did not want to see Western journalists at the breakfast buffet. “So, apparently, the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, is staying at our hotel, and it’s causing a lot of security issues,” Kristin Fisher, a Washington correspondent for Fox News, said in a video filmed at the Meliá just before Mr. Kim’s black limousine arrived.

Source: New York Times February 26, 2019 14:00 UTC