Photo: APTalks between President Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong Un have collapsed after the sides failed to bridge a standoff over US sanctions. However, North Korea said the US had squandered an opportunity for a nuclear deal and may not get another chance. "Basically, they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, and we couldn't do that," Trump told reporters. Kim, he explained, appeared willing to close his country's main nuclear facility, the Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center, if the sanctions were lifted. Longstanding US policy has insisted that US sanctions on North Korea would not be lifted until that country committed to, if not concluded, complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearisation.

Source: Otago Daily Times February 28, 2019 20:15 UTC