North Korea calls Pence's comments 'ignorant,' threatens to pull out of summit
North Korea is again threatening to not attend a summit next month with President Trump, with the country's vice minister of foreign affairs blasting Vice President Mike Pence for his "ignorant" comments comparing North Korea to Libya.
North Korea's state news agency KCNA on Thursday quoted Choe Son Hui as saying North Korea will "neither beg the U.S. for dialogue nor take the trouble to persuade them if they do not want to sit together with us. Whether the U.S. will meet us at a meeting room or encounter us at nuclear-to-nuclear showdown is entirely dependent upon the decision and behavior of the United States."
Pence made his remarks during an interview with Fox News on Monday, saying it would be a "mistake" for North Korea to "play" Trump, and Washington could return to the "Libya model." In 2004, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi made a deal with the U.S. to give up his nuclear weapons, and in 2011, after being forced out of power, he was captured and brutally killed.
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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