<![CDATA[US envoy for North Korea says 'diplomacy still very much alive' with Pyongyang despite summit collapse]>
The US envoy for North Korea said on Monday that "diplomacy is very much alive" with the hermit kingdom despite the collapse of last month's summit between the two countries' leaders, while another US official said she believed they would meet again in a third summit.
But US Envoy to North Korea Stephen Biegun said at a Washington nuclear conference that gaps remain between the sides and North Korea must show it is fully committed to elimination of its nuclear weapons.
"We are not going to do denuclearisation incrementally, and that is the position [on] which the US government has a complete unity," Biegun told the Carnegie Nuclear Conference, repeating the Trump administration's message that it would accept nothing less than "the final, fully-verified denuclearisation of North Korea".
"The foundation of US policy is denuclearisation," he said. "And until we can get to some point, or we have the same traction on that issue, and we have some issues, it makes difficult for us to move forward."
Biegun urged North Korea to honour past promises to eliminate its nuclear weapons.
His remarks came after Andrea Thompson, the US undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, had told conference attendees she believed a third summit between the two leaders would take place, although she did not know when.
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The leaders' second meeting in Hanoi, Vietnam, in February collapsed over North Korea's demands for relief from crippling US and United Nations sanctions and the US' insistence on the complete removal of nuclear weapons from North Korea.
The leaders met for the first time in Singapore in June last year, emerging with a vaguely worded statement on denuclearisation.
Beigun repeated that the US would "not lift the sanctions until North Korea has completed the denuclearisation process".
Thompson said it was "incredibly important" that sanctions remained in place until North Korea eliminated its nuclear weapons.
"We are not letting the foot off the gas," she said. "We are going to continue with the pressure campaign."
Trump says relationship with Kim Jong-un 'very good' despite summit flop
US think tanks and South Korean intelligence agencies said last week that Pyongyang had already begun reassembling a major rocket launch site. Biegun said the US was monitoring North Korea's activities closely, but ultimately, he admitted, "we don't know what Kim Jong-un will decide to do".
The parties remained far apart even though the top-level meetings created "space for us at the working level to test ideas and close the gaps", Biegun said.
"I know the president has talked about his willingness [to continue meeting with Kim, but] we don't have anything to announce today."
This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).
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