South Korea's Lee asks Trump to lead peaceful diplomacy with North Korea
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- Lee Jae Myung asked Trump to lead efforts to resolve the North Korea issue peacefully during a brief exchange at the G7 summit on June 16, comparing the task to Trump's work on the war in the Middle East.
- Trump initiated the conversation by asking Lee about the current state of relations with North Korea during a G7 leaders' group photo, according to presidential spokesperson Kang Yu-jung.
- Trump responded to Lee's request by saying he would work to address the North Korea issue, per spokesperson Kang Yu-jung.
- During his first term, Trump held three meetings with Kim Jong Un — Singapore in 2018, Hanoi in 2019, and a 2019 meeting at the Demilitarised Zone — focused on dismantling North Korea's nuclear programme and easing US-led sanctions.
- Trump said in August 2025 that he looked forward to seeing Kim Jong Un 'in the appropriate future' and in October said he would 'love' to meet Kim again.
- Trump last week posted a captionless photo of himself with Kim Jong Un on Truth Social, in what Lee's office framed as a reminder of their past diplomacy.
Why it matters: Lee's framing casts Trump as the lead actor on North Korea, drawing an explicit parallel to Trump's Middle East diplomacy — and Trump agreed on the spot. With three prior Kim summits on Trump's record and recent signals of renewed interest, a direct US-North Korea engagement channel has now been formally reopened at the presidential level.
