Trump becomes 1st sitting US leader to enter North Korea
Panmunjom, Jun 30: With grins and handshakes, President Donald Trump welcomed North Korea's Kim Jong Un at the heavily fortified Demilitarized Zone Sunday, seeking to revive talks on the pariah nation's nuclear program in a bid for a legacy-defining accord.
Trump then became the first sitting American leader to step into North Korea.
The brief photo-op, another historic first in the yearlong rapprochement between the two technically warring nations, marks a return to face-to-face contact between the leaders since talks broke down during a summit in Vietnam in February.
But it does little to erase significant doubts that remain about the future of the negotiations and the North's willingness to give up its stockpile of nuclear weapons.
Trump's brief crossing into North Korean territory marked the latest milestone in two years of roller-coaster diplomacy between the two nations, as personal taunts of "little rocket man" and threats to destroy the other have been ushered out by on-again, off-again talks, professions of love and flowery letters.
"I was proud to step over the line," Trump told Kim as they met in a building known as "Freedom House" on the South Korean side of the village.
"It is a great day for the world." Kim hailed the moment, saying of Trump, "I believe this is an expression of his willingness to eliminate all the unfortunate past and open a new future."
He added that he was "surprised" when Trump invited to meet by a tweet on Saturday.
Peering into North Korea from atop Observation Post Ouellette, Trump told reporters before meeting Kim that there has been "tremendous" improvement since his first meeting with the North's leader in Singapore last year.
Trump claimed the situation used to be marked by "tremendous danger" but "after our first summit, all of the danger went away."
But North has yet to provide an accounting of its nuclear stockpile, let alone begin the process of dismantling its arsenal.
The meeting at the truce city of Panmunjom also represented a striking acknowledgement by Trump of the authoritarian Kim's legitimacy over a nation with an abysmal human rights record.
Trump's summit with Kim in Vietnam earlier this year collapsed without an agreement for denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.
He became the first sitting U.S. president to meet with the leader of the isolated nation last year, when they signed an agreement in Singapore to bring the North toward denuclearization.
North Korea's nuclear threat has not been contained, Richard Haas, the president of the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations, tweeted Sunday.
Haas added that the threat of conflict has subsided only because "the Trump administration has decided it can live (with) a (North Korean) nuclear program while it pursues the chimera of denuclearization."
Substantive talks between the nations have largely broken down since the Vietnam summit. The North has balked at Trump's insistence that it give up its weapons before it sees relief from crushing international sanctions.
The U.S. has said the North must submit to "complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization" before sanctions are lifted.
Every president since Ronald Reagan has visited the 1953 armistice line, except for George H.W. Bush, who visited when he was vice president.
The show of bravado and support for South Korea, one of America's closest military allies, has evolved over the years to include binoculars and bomber jackets.
Trump, ever the showman, sought to one-up his predecessors with a Kim meeting.
The leaders met at a time of escalating tensions. While North Korea has not recently tested a long-range missile that could reach the U.S., last month it fired off a series of short-range missiles.
Trump has brushed off the significance of those tests, even as his own national security adviser, John Bolton, has said they violated U.N. Security Council resolutions.
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Karnataka Lokayukta to register case, probe Bowring wall collapse
Bengaluru (PTI): Karnataka Lokayukta Justice B S Patil on Thursday took serious note of the compound wall collapse at Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital in the city that killed seven people, and announced registration of a case on its own while warning of action against officials found responsible.
The Lokayukta, who visited the site and conducted an inspection, expressed strong displeasure over the incident and questioned the inaction of authorities, even as police and emergency teams had earlier rushed to the spot to rescue victims trapped under the debris following heavy rain, strong winds and a hailstorm on Wednesday evening.
“I will now register a suo motu case. This is not just about this one incident — such incidents must not occur anywhere in the state or the city in the future,” Justice Patil told reporters.
Seven people, including a six-year-old girl, were killed and seven others injured when the compound wall collapsed as rain-battered victims had taken shelter near it, according to police. The victims included people from Kerala who were in the city on a study tour.
Calling for systemic accountability, the Lokayukta said, “Dilapidated buildings and weakened compound walls, especially in areas with public access, must first be identified. They must either be repaired, demolished, or rebuilt.”
He added that responsibility would be fixed on officials of the BBMP and the concerned departments.
Justice Patil said that hearings would be conducted and preventive action initiated, while also probing those responsible for it, how the incident could have been prevented, and why it was not prevented.
A Scene of Crime Officers (SOCO) team and a Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) team also inspected the site, while police cordoned off Kovil Street to facilitate the probe.
Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar said the government had initiated measures following the rain-related incidents and stressed preparedness.
“Since last night we have initiated measures regarding the rains. When it rains heavily, we must be prepared, and we are working towards that,” he told reporters here.
On the wall collapse, Shivakumar said, “I will not directly blame any officials. It was an old wall, and trees had grown alongside it. Due to that pressure, it collapsed.”
The Deputy CM said instructions had been issued to identify such vulnerable structures and clear areas around them, including relocating street vendors.
Karnataka Medical Education Minister Sharan Prakash Patil said a technical assessment had been ordered.
“This is a very serious matter. Innocent people have been affected. We are issuing directions to the engineers to find out why this compound wall collapsed and to assess its structural strength,” he told reporters after inspecting the spot.
The Minister noted that the wall was ‘very old’ and required thorough examination to prevent recurrence.
Speaking to reporters, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge asked the Karnataka government to take precautions to ensure that incidents like the collapse of the Bengaluru government hospital compound wall, which caused loss of life, should not repeat.
Meanwhile, addressing a press conference, Shivajinagar MLA Rizwan Arshad said the collapse raised questions about construction and maintenance practices.
“If a wall collapses within 25 years of its construction, it needs to be examined -- whether there was any technical issue, or if anything was altered inside, weakening it. All this can only come out through a technical investigation,” he said.
The Congress MLA also called for wider structural audits across the city, stating that all such structures, whether private or government, must be audited.
He urged citizens to support victims, saying it was a collective responsibility in times of crisis.
