WASHINGTON -- The U.S. has little interest in joining other countries in a multination effort to get North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, President Donald Trump's national security adviser said Sunday.
John Bolton also affirmed on Fox News Sunday that the U.S. did not pay North Korea $2 million in 2017 in exchange for the release of American student Otto Warmbier.
On the nuclear issue, Bolton said the U.S. is not trying to exclude other nations from talks with Pyongyang, but "I think it's not what our preference is."
"I think Kim Jong Un, at least up until now, has wanted the one-on-one contact with the United States, which is what he has gotten," Bolton said.
After talks Thursday with Kim in Russia, President Vladimir Putin suggested the revival of a multilateral approach to the denuclearization negotiations, which has failed in the past. Putin said Kim is willing to give up nuclear weapons, but only if he gets ironclad security guarantees supported by a multinational agreement.
The U.S., North Korea, China, South Korea, Russia and Japan began so-called six-party negotiations in August 2003. North Korea accepted a deal in September 2005 to end its nuclear weapons program in exchange for security, economic and energy benefits. But disagreements between Washington and Pyongyang over financial sanctions imposed on the North temporarily derailed the six-nation talks before North Korea conducted its first nuclear test in October 2006.
The disarmament talks resumed a few weeks later, and the six governments reached a deal in February 2007 where North Korea would receive an aid package worth about $400 million in return for disabling its nuclear facilities and allowing international inspectors to verify the process. A final attempt to complete an agreement to fully dismantle North Korea's nuclear program fell through in December 2008 when the North refused to accept U.S.-proposed verification methods.
Trump's two high-profile meetings with Kim -- first in Singapore and then in late February in Hanoi -- have yielded no denuclearization road map. In Russia, Kim strongly criticized Washington for taking a "unilateral attitude in bad faith" in Hanoi that he said caused the diplomatic standstill, North Korea's state-run Korean Central News Agency said Friday.
Bolton said Trump is still looking at the possibility of a third summit with Kim.
"He feels pretty strongly about it," Bolton said. "He's said repeatedly he thinks he has a good relationship with Kim Jong Un and the six-party approach failed in the past."
Bolton also said Trump also does not favor Kim's desire for a step-by-step approach to denuclearization where North Korea would get some sanctions relief in exchange for taking steps toward denuclearization.
"I think if you look at the past policies, the answer to that is no," Bolton said, saying Trump prefers a grand bargain of complete denuclearization in exchange for ending all sanctions. "The past policies that have tried a step-by-step approach have all failed. Kim or his father have gotten economic relief and then somehow have never gotten around to that commitment to denuclearize."
NO PAYMENT
Bolton also emphasized to Fox News Sunday correspondent Chris Wallace that the U.S. didn't follow through on the $2 million pledged to pay for Warmbier's medical care during his time in North Korea.
Wallace asked Bolton whether Joseph Yun, then the U.S. special representative for North Korean policy, signed a document pledging the money in order to get Warmbier out of the country.
"That's what I am told," Bolton said.
Yun, a 30-year veteran of the U.S. foreign service, took the envoy post under President Barack Obama. He retired in March 2018, more than eight months after Warmbier died. Bolton joined the Trump administration in April 2018.
When Wallace asked if the U.S. paid any money to North Korea after Warmbier was released, Bolton replied, "Absolutely not, and I think that's the key point. The president has been very successful in getting 20-plus hostages released from imprisonment around the world and hasn't paid anything for any of them."
Wallace then asked, "So basically we signed the document fully intending not to honor it?"
"Well, I don't know the circumstances," Bolton replied. "I think when people leave government, sometimes their recollection of things that happened inside tend to be a little bit different from what actually happened, but it's very clear to me from my looking into it in the past few days, no money was paid. That is clear."
Warmbier, a University of Virginia student who was arrested for pulling down a sign in Pyongyang in January 2016, was sentenced to 15 years in prison. North Korea released Warmbier to the U.S. in 2017, at which point he was in a coma. He died days later.
The Washington Post reported last week that Pyongyang presented the U.S. with a $2 million medical bill before allowing Warmbier to be flown home.
In a tweet Friday, Trump denied that the U.S. had paid that bill. Later that day in front of the White House, the president said, "I haven't paid money for any hostage, and I have gotten approximately, I think it's 20 or 21 out."
Also in the interview, Bolton also dismissed as "completely ridiculous" a suggestion by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif that Bolton and other U.S. officials, as well as Israel and Saudi Arabia, are seeking to "lure" Trump into a conflict with Iran.
Asked whether he supported regime change in Iran, Bolton declined to answer, saying instead that U.S. sanctions on the country were having an effect.
"We think the pressure campaign has had a significant impact," Bolton said. "We'll see what happens as the economic pressure continues to grow."
In an earlier, pre-recorded interview on Fox, Zarif repeated an earlier reference calling Bolton and others "the B team." Bolton responded by noting similarly dismissive comments from officials in other countries with which the U.S. is at odds.
"In the past few days, the North Koreans have also called me dim-sighted," Bolton said. "The Cubans have said I'm a pathological liar. I'd say I've had a pretty good week."
Information for this article was contributed by Christopher Flavelle and Ben Brody of Bloomberg News; and by staff members of The Associated Press.
A Section on 04/29/2019