US will not make concessions to N.Korea: CIA

Washington, March 12 (IANS) The US government will not make concessions during negotiations with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and will demand that Pyongyang’s halt its missile tests and open the door to denuclearizing, CIA Director Mike Pompeo said on Sunday.

"While these negotiations are going on, there will be no concessions made. President Trump isn’t doing this for theater. He’s going to solve a problem," Pompeo said.

The CIA chief added that North Korea must offer "complete, verifiable and un-reversible proof" that it has halted its missile testing, although the US will maintain strict economic sanctions on Pyongyang, Efe reported.

The US President Donald Trump predicted on Saturday evening during a speech in Pennsylvania that his talks with Kim will be a "tremendous success" a few days after it was revealed that he had agreed to meet with the reclusive leader of the North Korean regime in an historic encounter which, if it comes off, would be the first time in history for a US president and a North Korean leader to meet.

"The President has made the decision; this is the right time to meet with Kim Jong-un," Pompeo said.

Although initially the meeting was scheduled for May, later White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that neither the location nor the date for the encounter had been set.

The surprising announcement about the top-level meeting was made by South Korean National Security Office chief Chung Eui-yong, who met on Thursday with Trump at the White House to relay a message to him from Kim, with whom Chung had met on Monday in Pyongyang.

The moves by the US and North Korean leaders to get together and talk face to face comes after a year of rising tensions, exchanges of insults and ongoing military threats.

Trump has called Kim a "madman" and a "maniac," while the North Korean leader has said that the US president is "mentally deranged."