With U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo expected to visit Pyongyang this week, working-level officials from North Korea and the U.S. reportedly met at the inter-Korean border over the weekend. <br />Our Lee Ji-won has more. <br />It seems as though talks to work out the process of North Korea's denuclearization have kicked off. <br /><br /> A senior U.S. State Department official on Sunday confirmed that U.S. ambassador to the Philippines and former nuclear negotiator, Sung Kim and North Korea's Vice Foreign Minister Choe Son-hui met again on Sunday at the truce village of Panmunjom on the inter-Korean border. <br /><br />This comes 19 days after the Pyongyang-Washington summit was held last month and is the first face-to-face meeting between the two sides since Singapore. <br /><br /> While not much is known about the details, the South Korean daily Chosun Ilbo reports that the two exchanged views on the current situation for about an hour. <br />And with U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo expected to visit Pyongyang this week, Sunday's meeting is thought to have covered the agenda for Pompeo's visit, mainly, North Korea's denuclearization. <br /><br /> Ambassador Kim and Choe were at the forefront of negotiations between Pyongyang and Washington in the lead up to the Singapore summit. <br />The two held a series of pre-summit meetings in Panmunjom,... and continued their talks in Singapore, right up until the first meeting between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and U.S. President Donald Trump. <br />At that time, reports said the two talked over the complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization of North Korea as well as its security guarantee from the U.S. <br /><br /> While follow-up meetings to the June 12th summit were expected to be held soon after the summit, this first publicly known contact between the two sides... was not announced beforehand. <br />But with Pompeo's upcoming visit to Pyongyang as well as the expectation that these working-level talks will be held again, there's hope the two sides can come up with a framework for their shared goal.<br />Lee Ji-won, Arirang News. <br />
