Tag Archives: Donald Trump

Trump ‘very committed’ to Mideast peace, envoy Kushner says

Trump 'very committed' to Mideast peace, envoy Kushner says

By Jeffrey Heller

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump remains “very committed” to achieving Israeli-Palestinian peace, his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the start of talks on Thursday.

But there was little to suggest any breakthrough or significant progress towards ending a decades-old conflict is imminent as Kushner began a day of separate meetings with Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Palestinians were still seeking a pledge of support from the Trump administration for the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel – the foundation of U.S. Middle East policy for the past two decades. The last round of peace talks between the two sides collapsed in 2014.

For his part, Netanyahu faces pressure from right-wing coalition partners not to give ground on Jewish settlement building in occupied territory that Palestinians seek for a independent state. The settlement issue contributed to the breakdown of negotiations three years ago.

“We have things to talk about – how to advance peace, stability and security in our region, prosperity too. And I think that all of them are within our reach,” Netanyahu, welcoming Kushner to his Tel Aviv office, said in a video clip released by the U.S. Embassy.

Kushner, a 36-year-old real estate developer with little experience of international diplomacy or political negotiation,

arrived in Israel with U.S. Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt on Wednesday after meeting Arab leaders in the Gulf, Egypt and Jordan.

“The president is very committed to achieving a solution here that will be able to bring prosperity and peace to all people in this area,” Kushner, who was tasked by Trump to help broker a peace deal, said in his response to Netanyahu.

“ULTIMATE DEAL”

Trump has described peace between Israelis and Palestinians as “the ultimate deal” – and added a new wrinkle last February by saying he was not fixed on two states co-existing side by side as a solution to their dispute.

In the West Bank, Nabil Abu Rdainah, a spokesman for Abbas, said Kushner’s visit – he last traveled to Israel and the Palestinian territories in June – could prove significant, particularly because of the envoy’s consultations with regional allies this week.

“This may create a new chance to reach a settlement based on the two-state solution and the Arab initiative and stop the current deterioration of the peace process.”

Abu Rdainah was referring to a 2002 Arab League initiative that offers Israel diplomatic recognition from Arab countries in return for a statehood deal with the Palestinians and a full Israeli withdrawal from territory captured in a 1967 war.

Netanyahu has expressed tentative support for parts of the blueprint, but there are many caveats on the Israeli side, including how to resolve the complex Palestinian refugee issue.

Painting a pessimistic picture, Mahmoud al-Aloul, the second-ranking official in Abbas’ Fatah movement, accused U.S. negotiators of focusing in their talks with the president on “Israeli lies” about Palestinian incitement to violence and ignoring what he described as fundamental statehood issues.

“I do not think the American envoys are coming carrying anything – nothing at all,” he told reporters.

(Additional reporting by Ali Sawafta in Ramallah and Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza, editing by Mark Heinrich)

Family of Chinese scholar missing in Illinois asks Trump for help

Chinese student Yingying Zhang is seen in a still image from security camera video taken outside an MTD Teal line bus in Urbana, Illinois, U.S. June 9, 2017. University of Illinois Police/Handout via REUTERS

(Reuters) – Family members of a Chinese scholar presumed kidnapped in Illinois asked President Donald Trump on Tuesday to provide additional resources to help find her.

Yingying Zhang, a 26-year-old visiting scholar to the University of Illinois from southeastern China, disappeared on June 9. Police believe Zhang is dead, although no body has been found.

Brendt Christensen, a former master’s student at the university, has been charged with abducting Zhang. Christensen, 28, pleaded not guilty to the kidnapping last month and is scheduled to stand trial in September.

Yingying Zhang’s father, Ronggao Zhang, cited the president’s own role as a father in a letter sent to Trump earlier this month and read by Zhang’s boyfriend, Xiaolin Hou, at a news conference on Tuesday.

“As a loving father to your own children, you can understand what we are going through,” the letter said. “We fervently request that you direct all available federal law enforcement and investigatory resources be used to find our daughter as soon as possible.”

A White House representative could not immediately be reached for comment.

Hou also told reporters at the news conference in Champaign, Illinois, that he and the family would not return to China until Zhang is found.

An online fundraising platform has collected more than $137,000 to support the family’s stay in the United States.

The case has been watched closely by Chinese media, China government officials and Chinese students in the United States.

Zhang, who had been studying photosynthesis and crop productivity, was last seen when a security camera recorded her getting into a black car that authorities linked to Christensen, according to court documents.

Christensen was placed under surveillance by federal agents who heard him talking about how he kidnapped Zhang, court records said. He could receive a life sentence if convicted.

Christensen’s attorney, Anthony Bruno, said in a phone interview on Tuesday that the defense received more than 1,000 pages of police reports related to the case earlier this month, and expects to gain access to video evidence soon.

Bruno said the defense plans to request a delay to the start of the trial to get additional time to review the “enormous” amount of evidence received from the government.

A spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Springfield, Illinois, office referred questions to U.S. Attorney spokeswoman Sharon Paul.

Paul said in a phone interview on Tuesday that prosecutors have no update on Yingying Zhang’s whereabouts and declined to provide details of the FBI’s search efforts.

(Reporting by Julia Jacobs in Chicago; Editing by Patrick Enright and Matthew Lewis)

Trump commits U.S. to open-ended Afghanistan war; Taliban vow ‘graveyard’

Military personnel watch as U.S. President Donald Trump announces his strategy for the war in Afghanistan during an address to the nation from Fort Myer, Virginia, U.S., August 21, 2017. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

By Steve Holland and Hamid Shalizi

WASHINGTON/KABUL (Reuters) – President Donald Trump committed U.S. troops to an open-ended war in Afghanistan, a decision the Afghan government welcomed on Tuesday but which Taliban insurgents warned would make the country a “graveyard for the American empire”.

Trump offered few specifics in a speech on Monday but promised a stepped-up military campaign against the Taliban who have gained ground against U.S.-backed Afghan government forces. He also singled out Pakistan for harboring militants in safe havens on its soil.

Trump, who had in the past advocated a U.S. withdrawal, acknowledged he was going against his instincts in approving the new campaign plan sought by his military advisers but said he was convinced that leaving posed more risk.

“The consequences of a rapid exit are both predictable and unacceptable,” he said. “A hasty withdrawal would create a vacuum that terrorists, including ISIS and al Qaeda, would instantly fill.”

Still, he promised an end to “nation-building” by U.S. forces in what has become American’s longest war and stressed that ultimately Afghanistan’s struggling police and army must defeat the Taliban.

“The stronger the Afghan security forces become, the less we will have to do. Afghans will secure and build their own nation and define their own future. We want them to succeed.”

Most of the approximately 8,400 U.S. troops in Afghanistan work with a NATO-led training and advising mission, with the rest part of a counter-terrorism force that mostly targets pockets of al Qaeda and Islamic State fighters.

While Trump said he would not discuss troop levels or details of the new strategy, U.S. officials said on Monday he had signed off on Defense Secretary James Mattis’ plans to send about 4,000 more troops to Afghanistan.

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, in welcoming the strategy, said it would increase the capacity of the training mission for Afghan forces, including enhancing its fledgling air force and doubling the size of the Afghan special forces.

“I am grateful to President Trump and the American people for this affirmation of support … for our joint struggle to rid the region from the threat of terrorism,” Ghani said in a statement.

The Taliban swiftly condemned Trump’s decision to keep American troops in Afghanistan without a withdrawal timetable, vowing to continue “jihad” until all U.S. soldiers were gone.

“If the U.S. does not pull all its forces out of Afghanistan, we will make this country the 21st century graveyard for the American empire,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement.

Republican Trump, who had criticized his predecessors for setting deadlines for drawing down troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, declined to put a timeline on expanded U.S. operations in Afghanistan.

Trump now inherits the same challenges as George W. Bush and Barack Obama, including a stubborn Taliban insurgency and a weak, divided Kabul government. He is laying the groundwork for greater U.S. involvement without a clear end in sight or providing specific benchmarks for success.

‘NO BLANK CHECK’

Trump warned that U.S. support “is not a blank check,” and insisted he would not engage in “nation-building,” a practice he has accused his predecessors of doing at huge cost.

Trump insisted through his speech that the Afghan government, Pakistan, India, and NATO allies step up their own commitment to resolving the 16-year conflict.

“We can no longer be silent about Pakistan’s safe havens,” he said.

Senior U.S. officials warned he could reduce security assistance for nuclear-armed Pakistan unless it cooperated more.

A Pakistani army spokesman said on Monday that Pakistan had taken action against all Islamist militants.

“There are no terrorist hideouts in Pakistan,” spokesman Major General Asif Ghafoor said.

Pakistan sees Afghanistan as a vital strategic interest. Obama sent Navy SEALs into Pakistan to kill al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, the architect of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that triggered the war in Afghanistan.

The Taliban government was overthrown by U.S.-backed Afghan forces in late 2001 but U.S. forces have been bogged down there ever since. About 2,400 U.S. troops have died in Afghanistan.

Trump expanded the U.S. military’s authority for American forces to target militant and criminal networks, warning “that no place is beyond the reach of American arms”.

“Our troops will fight to win,” he said.

Trump’s speech came after a months-long review of U.S. policy in which the president frequently tangled with his top advisers.

He suggested he was hoping for eventual peace talks, and said it might be possible to have a political settlement with elements of the Taliban.

He said he was convinced by his national security advisers to strengthen the U.S. ability to prevent the Taliban from ousting Ghani’s government.

“My original instinct was to pull out,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Ayesha Rascoe, David Alexander, Yeganeh Torbati and Jeff Mason in WASHINGTON, Mirwais Harooni in KABUL, and Jibran Ahmad in PESHAWAR; Writing by Steve Holland and Warren Strobel; Editing by Yara Bayoumy, Peter Cooney and Paul Tait)

Big protests expected as Trump plans Phoenix rally

Big protests expected as Trump plans Phoenix rally

By Ayesha Rascoe

WASHINGTON(Reuters) – Large protests could greet President Donald Trump on Tuesday when he travels to Arizona for his first campaign rally since he caused an uproar with his remarks about a white nationalist demonstration in Virginia.

Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton, a Democrat, asked the Republican president to postpone Tuesday’s event scheduled for 7 p.m. MST (0200 GMT on Wednesday) in light of his response to the street battles that broke out earlier this month at a protest against the removal of a Confederate statue in Charlottesville.

Trump was widely criticized for blaming both white nationalists and counter-protesters for the violence at the rally organized by neo-Nazis and white supremacists.

“America is hurting. And it is hurting largely because Trump has doused racial tensions with gasoline,” Stanton wrote in the Washington Post. “With his planned visit to Phoenix on Tuesday, I fear the president may be looking to light a match.”

Several anti-Trump demonstrations are planned for Phoenix, according to social media postings by local activists.

Some White House officials privately expressed concern on Monday about Trump’s Phoenix rally, fearing he might revisit the Charlottesville issue in the heat of the moment while cheered on by thousands of supporters.

Trump has railed against the media coverage of his remarks, saying on Twitter that news outlets “totally misrepresent what I say about hate, bigotry.”

It will be Trump’s first trip as president to Arizona, which he won in the 2016 election. He will also visit a border protection facility in Yuma, Arizona, along the U.S.-Mexican border as he seeks congressional funding for the wall he wants built..

Republican Governor Doug Ducey told the Arizona Republic on Monday that he would welcome Trump on the tarmac when he arrived but would not attend the campaign rally. Instead, he said he would be focused on ensuring the safety of the event.

Trump has clashed with Arizona’s two Republican U.S. senators, John McCain and Jeff Flake, on various issues. Both lawmakers are critics of the president.

Last week, Trump in a tweet called Flake “WEAK on borders, crime and a non-factor in Senate. He’s toxic!” and appeared to endorse Kelli Ward, Flake’s Republican challenger in his 2018 re-election race.

Trump said earlier this month that he was considering pardoning Joe Arpaio, the former Arizona sheriff found guilty of criminal contempt for violating the terms of a 2011 court order in a racial profiling case.

(Additional reporting by Steve Holland; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Trump lifts Cyber Command status to boost cyber defense

Trump lifts Cyber Command status to boost cyber defense

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump said on Friday he was elevating the status of the Pentagon’s U.S. Cyber Command to help spur development of cyber weapons to deter attacks and punish intruders.

In a statement, Trump said the unit would be ranked at the level of Unified Combatant Command focused on cyberspace operations.

Cyber Command’s elevation reflects a push to strengthen U.S. capabilities to interfere with the military programs of adversaries such as North Korea’s nuclear and missile development and Islamic State’s ability to recruit, inspire and direct attacks, three U.S. intelligence officials said this month, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Cyber Command had been subordinate to the U.S. Strategic Command, which is also responsible for military space operations, nuclear weapons and missile defense.

Once elevated, Cyber Command would have the same status as U.S. Strategic Command and eight other unified commands that control U.s. military forces and are composed of personnel from multiple branches of the armed services.

The Pentagon did not specify how long the elevation process would take.

Current and former officials said a leading candidate to head U.S. Cyber Command was Army Lt. Gen. William Mayville, currently director of the Pentagon’s Joint Staff.

Trump also said the defense secretary was also considering separating the U.S. Cyber Command from the National Security Agency (NSA). Cyber Command’s mission is to shut down and, when ordered, counter cyber attacks. The NSA’s role is to gather intelligence and generally favors monitoring enemies’ cyber activities.

Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, both strong voices on security matters, praised the move and said it would boost the command’s abilities.

Still, McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said more steps were needed to meet the nation’s cyber security challenges.

“We must develop a clear policy and strategy for deterring and responding to cyber threats. We must also develop an integrated, whole-of-government approach to protect and defend the United States from cyberattacks,” he said in a statement.

The new combatant command will improve U.S. capabilities to punish foreign cyberattacks and discourage attempts to disrupt critical U.S. infrastructure such as financial networks, electric grids, and medical systems. It will establish a cyber version of the nuclear doctrine of “mutual assured destruction” between the United States and the former Soviet Union, the three U.S. officials said

The U.S. is more vulnerable to cyber intrusions than its most capable adversaries, including China, Russia, and North Korea, because its economy is more dependent on the internet, two of the officials said. As other nations improve their communications networks, their vulnerability will grow, they added.

(Reporting by Makini Brice and Susan Heavey. Additional reporting by Idrees Ali, John Walcott and Warren Strobel.; Editing by Franklin Paul and Andrew Hay)

Museum or dumpster? U.S. cities wrestle with Confederate statues’ fate

Museum or dumpster? U.S. cities wrestle with Confederate statues' fate

By Gabriella Borter

(Reuters) – As communities across the United States redouble efforts to remove Confederate monuments from public spaces after a far-right rally in Virginia turned deadly, city leaders now face another conundrum: what to do with the statues.

President Donald Trump described them on Thursday as “beautiful statues and monuments,” part of the history and culture of the country that will be “greatly missed.”

But they are seen by many Americans as symbols of racism and glorifications of the Confederate defense of slavery in the Civil War, fueling the debate over race and politics in America.

Cities are speeding up their removal since Saturday’s rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a suspected white supremacist crashed a car into a crowd, killing one woman, during protests against the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee, who headed the Confederate army in the American Civil War.

Since Monday, officials in Baltimore and Gainesville, Florida, have taken down statues while another was torn from its plinth by protesters in Durham, North Carolina. Calls for more to be removed have grown louder.

This has created an additional headache for cities and spurred another debate: how to dispose of the statues once they are taken down.

Some have suggested museums, others putting them in Confederate cemeteries and one city councilman proposed using their metal to make likenesses of civil rights leaders.

“Melting them down and using the materials to make monuments for Frederick Douglass, Thurgood Marshall, Harriet Tubman would be powerful!” Baltimore city councilman Brandon Scott wrote on Twitter this week. The mayor’s office said that was unlikely.

UNLIKE EASTERN EUROPE

The debate contrasts sharply with how Eastern Europe handled thousands of statues following the collapse of Communism in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Often pulled down by angry mobs, some of the statues ended up in dumpsters and others in museums to teach people the evils of totalitarian regimes. In Budapest, a for-profit park hosts about 40 statues of communist heroes such as Karl Marx.

In the U.S. South, the debate still rages between those nostalgic for the past and those who view the monuments as painful reminders of slavery.

There are more than 700 Confederate statues in the United States according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, most of them created in the 1910s and 1920s, decades after the Civil War ended. They were intended to reassert the power of white people, said Jonathan Leib, Chair of Political Science and Geography at Old Dominion University in Virginia.

“They’re visible, tangible expressions of power,” he said on Thursday.

In Birmingham, Alabama, Mayor William Bell ordered workers to hide a Confederate statue behind plywood boards, while the city challenges a state law banning the removal of such monuments.

“They represent acts of sedition against the United States of America and treason against the United State of America,” he told Reuters on Wednesday.

But sympathies persist, as both lawmakers and citizens resist plans to remove them.

“I absolutely disagree with this sanitization of history,” Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin, a Republican, told WVHU radio on Tuesday.

PROPER CONTEXT

For now, many of the removed statues gather dust in warehouses or, as in the case of New Orleans, sit disassembled in a city scrap yard, where two were found by local reporters.

In Baltimore, statues are now in storage, according to the mayor’s spokesman Anthony McCarthy, who said they will likely end up in a Confederate cemetery or a museum.

Many city legislators have expressed interest in relocating statues to museums, where they might be viewed as historical artifacts and not rallying points for racism.

Anna Lopez Brosche, city council president in Jacksonville, Florida, encouraged the removal of Confederate statues from public property on Monday and proposed placing them where they will be “historically contextualized.”

In Lexington, Kentucky, Mayor Jim Gray has proposed removing statues from one city park, formerly the site of a slave auction block and whipping post.

Meanwhile, a statue removed in Gainesville, Florida, on Monday is being returned to a local chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, which erected it in 1904.

The group, founded in 1894 by women descended from Confederate soldiers, put up many of the statues as part of their goal to display what they call “a truthful history” of the Civil War and mark places “made historic by Confederate valor.”

Some historians argue that, as in Eastern Europe, the Confederate monuments should be preserved, but in the proper context.

“A slave whipping post isn’t something we want up, just out in public without interpretation,” said W. Fitzhugh Brundage, American History professor at the University of North Carolina.

“But on the other hand, if you have it in the Smithsonian where people can see it and it can be properly interpreted, it’s a valuable teaching tool.”

(Reporting by Gabriella Borter in New York; Additional reporting by Taylor Harris and Jonathan Allen in New York; Editing by Dina Kyriakidou and Matthew Lewis)

Backlash against Trump intensifies after his comments on Virginia violence

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks about the violence, injuries and deaths at the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville as he talks to the media with Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao (R) at his side in the lobby of Trump Tower in Manhattan, New York, U.S., August 15, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

By Susan Heavey and Jeff Mason

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – Several leading members of Donald Trump’s Republican Party and key ally Britain sharply rebuked the U.S. president on Wednesday after he insisted that white nationalists and protesters opposed to them were both to blame for deadly violence in the Virginia city of Charlottesville.

Trump’s remarks on Tuesday, a more vehement reprisal of what had been widely seen as his inadequate initial response to Saturday’s bloodshed around a white nationalist rally, reignited a storm of criticism and strained ties with his own party.

The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, issued a statement that did not mention Trump by name but said “messages of hate and bigotry” from white supremacists, the Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi groups should not be welcome anywhere in the United States.

“We can have no tolerance for an ideology of racial hatred. There are no good neo-Nazis, and those who espouse their views are not supporters of American ideals and freedoms. We all have a responsibility to stand against hate and violence, wherever it raises its evil head,” McConnell said.

Trump last week lambasted McConnell for the Senate’s failure to pass healthcare legislation backed by the president, and did not dismiss the idea of McConnell stepping down.

In his comments at a heated news conference in New York on Tuesday, Trump said “there is blame on both sides” of the violence in Charlottesville, and that there were “very fine people” on both sides.

Ohio Governor John Kasich said there was no moral equivalency between the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis and anybody else.

“This is terrible. The president of the United States needs to condemn these kind of hate groups,” Kasich said on NBC’s “Today” show. Failure to do so gave such organizations a sense of victory and license to hold more events elsewhere, said Kasich, one of Trump’s rivals for the Republican nomination in the 2016 presidential election.

A 20-year-old Ohio man said to have harbored Nazi sympathies was charged with murder after the car he was driving plowed into counter-protesters, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer and injuring 19 others. Heyer was being remembered on Wednesday at a memorial service in Charlottesville.

Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, long a critic of the president, took direct aim, saying in a statement aimed at Trump, “Your words are dividing Americans, not healing them.”

Other Republicans to criticize Trump’s remarks included former Massachusetts governor and 2012 Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and U.S. Senator Marco Rubio, also a Trump rival in the 2016 campaign.

Republican former presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush said in a joint statement: “America must always reject racial bigotry, anti-Semitism, and hatred in all forms.”

CRITICISM FROM MAY

In London, British Prime Minister Theresa May offered a rare rebuke of Trump by one of the United States’ closest foreign allies.

“I see no equivalence between those who propound fascist views and those who oppose them and I think it is important for all those in positions of responsibility to condemn far-right views wherever we hear them,” May told reporters when asked to comment on Trump’s stance.

May has been widely criticized by political opponents in Britain for her efforts to cultivate close ties with Trump since he took office in January.

Senior U.S. military officers usually stay clear of politics, but two more of the U.S. military’s top officers weighed in on Wednesday, without mentioning Trump.

U.S. Army Chief of Staff General Mark Milley wrote on Twitter, “The Army doesn’t tolerate racism, extremism, or hatred in our ranks. It’s against our Values and everything we’ve stood for since 1775.”

Air Force Chief of Staff General Dave Goldfein‏ said on Twitter that “I stand with my fellow service chiefs in saying we’re always stronger together.”

Their comments followed similar ones from the top officers of the Navy and Marine Corps.

White nationalists called the rally in Charlottesville to protest the planned removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee, commander of the pro-slavery Confederate army during the U.S. Civil War. Many protesters were seen carrying firearms, sticks, shields, and lit torches. Some wore helmets. Counter-protesters came equipped with sticks, helmets and shields.

Trump’s comments on Tuesday followed a statement on Monday in which he had bowed to political pressure over his initial response that talked of “many sides” being involved, and had explicitly denounced the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis and white supremacists.

Ronna Romney McDaniel, head of the Republican National Committee, said on Wednesday that Trump had simply acknowledged there had been violent individuals on both sides of the clashes in Charlottesville. But she assigned the blame to the white nationalists who mounted the rally, saying, “We have no place in our party for KKK, anti-Semitism … racism, bigotry.”

Amid the fraying ties with his party, Trump planned a rally next Tuesday in Arizona, home state of two Republican U.S. senators, John McCain and Jeff Flake, who have been particularly critical of him.

In a staff decision on Wednesday, Hope Hicks, a close aide to Trump, has been named as interim White House director of communications, temporarily taking the post left vacant after Anthony Scaramucci was fired last month, a senior White House official said.

(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Susan Heavey; Additional reporting by Steve Holland, Makini Brice and Mohammad Zargham in Washington; Writing by Will Dunham; Editing by Frances Kerry)

Trump praises N.Korean leader’s decision not to fire missiles towards Guam

Trump praises N.Korean leader's decision not to fire missiles towards Guam

By Ben Blanchard and Tim Kelly

BEIJING/TOKYO (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday praised North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for a “wise” decision not to fire missiles towards the U.S. territory of Guam and for easing escalating tension between the two countries.

Reclusive North Korea has made no secret of its plan to develop a missile capable of firing a nuclear warhead at the United States to counter what it perceives as constant U.S. threats of invasion, and tension has been rising for months.

Trump warned North Korea last week it would face “fire and fury” if it threatened the United States, prompting North Korea to say it was considering test-firing missiles towards the Pacific island of Guam.

But North Korean media reported on Tuesday Kim had delayed the decision while he awaited to see what the United States did next.

“Kim Jong Un of North Korea made a very wise and well reasoned decision,” Trump wrote on Twitter.

“The alternative would have been both catastrophic and unacceptable!”

North Korea has long ignored warnings from the West and from its lone major ally, China, to halt its nuclear and missile tests which it conducts in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions.

The United States has been hoping China can press the North to rein in its weapons programmes. The top U.S. general reiterated that in talks in Beijing this week.

Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford told Fang Fenghui, chief of the Joint Staff Department of the People’s Liberation Army, in Beijing that North Korea’s weapons programmes threatened the entire international community, including China.

“He emphasised that the U.S. and China have the same goal – a denuclearised Korean peninsula achieved through peaceful means … North Korean actions threaten the economic and military security of China,” a U.S. military spokesman said in a statement.

“In the interest of regional stability, he said the U.S. views with growing urgency the need for China to increase pressure on the North Korean regime,” the spokesman said.

“Should preferred diplomatic and economic peaceful options fail, General Dunford reiterated America’s resolve to use the full range of military capabilities to defend our allies in the Republic of Korea and Japan, as well as the U.S. homeland.”

‘SOLIDARITY AND RESOLVE’

China has repeatedly called for all sides to exercise restraint and remain calm, and while it has signed up for tough U.N. sanctions on North Korea, it says the key to a resolution lies in Washington and Pyongyang talking to each other, rather than expecting China to do all the work.

Japan conducted air manoeuvres with U.S. bombers southwest of the Korean peninsula on Wednesday involving two U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers flying from Andersen Air Force Base on Guam and two Japanese F-15 jet fighters, Japan’s Air Self Defence Force said in a news release.

“These training flights with Japan demonstrate the solidarity and resolve we share with our allies to preserve peace and security in the Indo-Asia-Pacific,” the U.S. Air Force said.

The U.S. aircraft have flown several sorties in East Asia over recent weeks. In addition to air drills with Japanese fighters, the bombers have also exercised with South Korean aircraft.

North Korea regards the U.S. exercises with South Korea and Japan as preparations for invasion. The exercises also upset China, which says they do nothing to ease tension.

On Wednesday, a senior Chinese military officer reiterated China’s position on the need to maintain peace and stability to Dunford, China’s Defence Ministry said.

Song Puxuan, commander of China’s Northern Theatre Command, stressed to Dunford that the North Korean nuclear issue must be resolved politically through talks, the ministry added.

The command is based in China’s northeastern city of Shenyang and has responsibility for a swath of northern China, including the border with North Korea.

North Korea’s threat to fire towards Guam had prompted U.S. Trump to say the U.S. military was “locked and loaded” if North Korea acted unwisely.

‘RECKLESS ACTIONS’

In his first public appearance in about two weeks, Kim on Monday inspected the command of North Korea’s army, examining the plan to fire four missiles aimed at landing near Guam, the official KCNA news agency reported.

“He said that if the Yankees persist in their extremely dangerous reckless actions on the Korean peninsula and in its vicinity, testing the self-restraint of the DPRK, the latter will make an important decision as it already declared,” KCNA said.

DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, North Korea’s official name.

Wednesday’s air exercise took place close to Japanese-controlled islets in the East China Sea which are also claimed by China. The uninhabited territory is known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China.

While the United States has declined to take sides in the dispute over the tiny islands, it nonetheless has said it would defend them from attack under its security alliance with Japan.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, in a telephone conversation with Sigmar Gabriel, Germany’s minister for foreign affairs, said tension on the Korean peninsula was showing some signs of easing but had not passed.

The parties involved should “make a correct judgment and wise choice by taking a responsible attitude toward history and people”, Wang said, according to a statement on his ministry’s website.

(Additional reporting by Nobuhiro Kubo, and Ben Blanchard in BEIJING; Editing by Nick Macfie, Robert Birsel)

North Korea delays Guam missile firing, U.S. says dialogue up to Kim

North Korea delays Guam missile firing, U.S. says dialogue up to Kim

By Christine Kim and Yeganeh Torbati

SEOUL/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has delayed a decision on firing missiles towards Guam while he waits to see what the United States does, the North’s state media reported on Tuesday as the United States said any dialogue was up to Kim.

The United States and South Korea have prepared for more joint military drills, which has infuriated the North, and experts warned it could still go ahead with a provocative plan.

In his first public appearance in about two weeks, Kim inspected the command of the North’s army on Monday, examining a plan to fire four missiles aimed at landing near the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam, the official KCNA news agency reported.

“He said that if the Yankees persist in their extremely dangerous reckless actions on the Korean peninsula and in its vicinity, testing the self-restraint of the DPRK, the latter will make an important decision as it already declared,” KCNA said.

The DPRK stands for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Pyongyang’s plans to fire missiles near Guam prompted a surge in tensions in the region last week, with U.S. President Donald Trump saying the U.S. military was “locked and loaded” if North Korea acted unwisely.

But U.S. officials have taken a gentler tone in recent days.

Asked by reporters on Tuesday about the North Korean delay, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said it was up to Kim to decide if he wants to talk to the United States.

“We continue to be interested in finding a way to get to dialogue but that’s up to him,” Tillerson told reporters.

In photos released with the KCNA report, Kim was seen holding a baton and pointing at a map showing a flight path for the missiles appearing to start from North Korea’s east coast, flying over Japan toward Guam. North Korea has often threatened to attack the United States and its bases and released similar photos in the past but never followed through.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in said on Tuesday his government would prevent war by all means.

“Military action on the Korean peninsula can only be decided by South Korea and no one else can decide to take military action without the consent of South Korea,” Moon said in a speech to commemorate the anniversary of the nation’s liberation from Japanese military rule in 1945.

“The government, putting everything on the line, will block war by all means,” Moon said.

Asian shares rose for a second day on Tuesday and the dollar firmed after Kim’s comments. U.S. stocks were flat at midday on Tuesday.

Speaking to his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said it was urgent the United States and North Korea “put the brakes” on mutually irritating words and actions, China’s Foreign Ministry said.

‘NO STEPPING BACK’

Japan will seek further reassurance from Washington in meetings between Japan’s defense chief and foreign minister and their U.S. counterparts on Thursday.

“The strategic environment is becoming harsher and we need to discuss how we will respond to that,” a Japanese foreign ministry official said in a briefing in Tokyo.

“We will look for the U.S. to reaffirm it defense commitment, including the nuclear deterrent.”

The Liberation Day holiday, celebrated by both North and South, will be followed next week by joint U.S.-South Korean military drills.

North Korea has persisted with its nuclear and missile programs to ward off perceived U.S. hostility, in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions and sanctions.

China, North Korea’s main ally and trading partner, has repeatedly urged Pyongyang to halt its weapons program and at the same time urged South Korea and the United States to stop military drills to lower tensions.

Kim Dong-yub, a professor and military expert at Kyungnam University’s Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul, urged caution in assuming North Korea was bluffing with its missile threats.

“There is no stepping back for North Korea. Those who don’t know the North very well fall into this trap every time (thinking they are easing threats) but we’ve seen this before.”

The United States and South Korea remain technically at war with North Korea after the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a truce, not a peace treaty.

North Korea is currently holding three U.S. citizens it accuses of espionage or hostile acts, but now is not the right time to discuss them, KCNA reported, cited a foreign ministry spokesman.

Pyongyang has used detainees to extract concessions, including high-profile visitors from the United States, which has no formal diplomatic relations with North Korea.

On Guam, home to a U.S. air base, a Navy installation, a Coast Guard group and roughly 6,000 U.S. military personnel, residents expressed relief at the lessening of tensions.

“I’m reading between the lines that I don’t see an imminent threat,” Guam Lieutenant Governor Ray Tenorio told a media briefing in the island’s capital of Hagatna.

For an interactive on North Korea’s missile capabilities, click: http://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/rngs/NORTHKOREA-MISSILES/010041L63FE/index.html

For a graphic on North Korea’s missile trajectories, ranges, click: http://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/rngs/NORTHKOREA-MISSILES/010050CG0RT/NORTHKOREA-MISSILES.png

For a graphic on Americans detained by North Korea, click: http://apac1.proxy.cp.extranet.thomsonreuters.biz/fingfx/gfx/rngs/USA-NORTHKOREA/0100412Z2B4/northkorea-detainee.jpg

(Additional reporting by Soyoung Kim and Jane Chung in Seoul, Tim Kelly in Tokyo, Ben Blanchard in Beijing and Joseph Campbell in Guam; Writing by Lincoln Feast and Alistair Bell; Editing by Michael Perry, Nick Macfie and Jeffrey Benkoe)

Venezuela’s Maduro calls for military exercises after Trump threat

Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro stands next to a sign that reads "Trump go away from Latin America" gives a speech at a rally against U.S President Donald Trump in Caracas, Venezuela August 14, 2017. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino

By Brian Ellsworth and Hugh Bronstein

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Monday called for military exercises after U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat of a possible armed intervention in the country, but Maduro insisted he still wanted to hold talks with the U.S. leader.

As Maduro told supporters in Caracas to prepare for an “imperialist” invasion, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence sought to calm concerns in the region about Trump’s talk, promising a peaceful solution to Venezuela’s “collapse into dictatorship.”

The unpopular Maduro, struggling with a disintegrating economy at home and increasing diplomatic isolation abroad, has used Trump’s comments on Friday to reaffirm long-standing accusations that Washington is preparing a military attack.

“Everyone has to join the defense plan, millions of men and women, let’s see how the American imperialists like it,” Maduro told supporters, urging them to join the two-day operation on Aug 26 and 27 involving both soldiers and civilians.

Thousands of government supporters rallied in Caracas where they denounced Trump’s suggestion of a “military option” to resolve Venezuela’s crisis.

Over 120 people have been killed since anti-government protests began in April, driven by outrage over shortages of food and medicine and Maduro’s creation of a legislative superbody that governments around the world say is dictatorial.

Maduro said Trump’s advisors had confused him about the true situation in Venezuela.

“I want to talk by phone with Mr. Trump, to tell him ‘They’re fooling you, Trump, everything they tell you about Venezuela is a lie. They’re throwing you off a cliff.'”

The White House last week rebuffed Maduro’s request to speak to Trump, saying the president would talk with Venezuela’s leader when the country returned to democracy.

‘FAILED STATE’

Earlier in the day, Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino appeared in a televised broadcast with dozens of battle-ready troops behind him at an army base, including soldiers with shoulder-fired missile launchers pointed skyward.

In a speech, he warned that the United States wanted to steal the OPEC nation’s oil reserves.

Late socialist leader Hugo Chavez frequently staged military exercises during his 14-year rule, many of which involved defending the country against mock foreign armies.

Critics generally dismissed them as bravado meant to distract from problems at home.

Venezuela’s opposition coalition on Sunday rejected foreign threats to the country. It did not specifically identify Trump or the United States, but criticized Maduro’s close relationship with Communist-run Cuba.

Vice President Pence said the United States would bring economic and diplomatic power to restore democracy in Venezuela.

“A failed state in Venezuela threatens the security and prosperity of our entire hemisphere and the people of the United States of America,” said Pence, speaking to reporters in the Colombian coastal city of Cartagena.

“The regime is experiencing change right now and what we’re witnessing is Venezuela is collapsing into dictatorship.”

Countries across Latin America, where the United States flexed its military muscles throughout the 20th century, rejected Trump’s comments and said U.S. intervention was unwelcome.

On Sunday night, in an apparent effort to ease alarm, Pence said the United States was confident that a peaceful solution could be found to the country’s political and economic crises.

The country last month, at Maduro’s behest, elected a “constituent assembly” with sweeping powers including the capacity to rewrite the constitution. Maduro says the assembly will bring peace to the country.

His adversaries boycotted the election, calling it a power grab meant to keep the ruling Socialist Party in power and insisting it will do nothing to tame soaring inflation or resolve food and medicine shortages.

(Additional reporting by Tim Ahmann in Washington and Julia Symmes Cobb in Bogota, Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Andrew Hay)