Jimmy Carter said he wants to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to talk about peace, Newsweek reported, before things spiral any farther out of control.
The former U.S. president played a vital role in reducing tensions between the U.S. and North Korea in 1994, when he visited the rogue state to help ease its strained relationship with then president Bill Clinton,.
Now Carter has expressed an interest in re-enacting that role with Jong Un.
Park Han-shik, an emeritus professor of international affairs at the University of Georgia, said on Sunday that “Carter wants to meet with the North Korean leader and play a constructive role for peace on the Korean Peninsula as he did in 1994,” Korea JoongAng Daily reported.
Han-shik explained that Carter hoped to meet with Jong Un to discuss a peace treaty between North Korea and the U.S. as well as a complete denuclearization of North Korea.
“He wants to employ his experience visiting North Korea to prevent a second Korean War,” Han-shik said, per Korea JoongAng Daily.
Newsweek reported that, in 1994, Carter was prompted to travel to Pyongyang to negotiate with then-leader Kim Il Sung in an effort to get North Korea to put a hold on its nuclear program.
This came amid tensions over the state’s nuclear ambitions and following Clinton’s intentions to strike a nuclear reactor in Yongbyon, but Carter was successful in diffusing the situation.
Now, 23 years later, Kim Jong Un has taken off where his father left off and resumed nuclear testing.
Earlier this year President Donald Trump imposed tougher sanctions and allowing the U.S. to freeze assets of financial institutions of anyone conducting "significant" trade in goods, services, or technology with Pyongyang.
He has also embarked upon a rigorous Twitter campaign, slamming North Korea and its leader at every turn.
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