Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Thursday that while North Korean leader Kim Jong Un may be a ruthless, murderous dictator, he is not mentally insane.
"All indications are that he is not crazy," Tillerson told Fox News. "He may be ruthless. He may be a murderer. He may be someone who in many respects we would say by our standards is irrational. But he is not insane."
The secretary of state also said Thursday that the U.S. would prefer to resolve the ongoing nuclear proliferation standoff with North Korea through direct talks. Previous administrations generally favored only multilateral talks with North Korea.
In a pair of interviews, with Fox News and NPR, Tillerson offered expanded views on North Korea.
Tillerson, during an interview with NPR, set specific conditions for bilateral talks to occur: North Korea, he said, would have to be open to altering their agenda, rather than continuing their current course of military action. Asked whether such talks could help pacify the international dispute, Tillerson said they could.
“Obviously, that will be the way we would like to solve this," he told NPR. "But North Korea has to decide they're ready to talk to us about the about the right agenda and the right agenda is not simply stopping where they are for a few more months or a few more years and then resuming things. That's been the agenda for the last 20 years.”
"All indications are that he is not crazy," Tillerson told Fox News. "He may be ruthless. He may be a murderer. He may be someone who in many respects we would say by our standards is irrational. But he is not insane."
The secretary of state also said Thursday that the U.S. would prefer to resolve the ongoing nuclear proliferation standoff with North Korea through direct talks. Previous administrations generally favored only multilateral talks with North Korea.
In a pair of interviews, with Fox News and NPR, Tillerson offered expanded views on North Korea.
Tillerson, during an interview with NPR, set specific conditions for bilateral talks to occur: North Korea, he said, would have to be open to altering their agenda, rather than continuing their current course of military action. Asked whether such talks could help pacify the international dispute, Tillerson said they could.
“Obviously, that will be the way we would like to solve this," he told NPR. "But North Korea has to decide they're ready to talk to us about the about the right agenda and the right agenda is not simply stopping where they are for a few more months or a few more years and then resuming things. That's been the agenda for the last 20 years.”
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