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Trump-Kim summit: Opinion
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Vietnam’s role as host of the high-profile summit has consolidated its friendship with the US, further boosting its standing in Southeast Asian affairs.

Donald Kirk says the US president has raised false hopes of Korean reunification but the North Korean leader’s agenda cannot coincide with democracy

Despite its many critics, the Trump-Kim summit paves the way to peace on the Korean peninsula by avoiding the pitfalls of deadlines and demands – the diplomats will work all that out later.

The US president may have earned his ‘dotard’ nickname in Singapore by signalling interest in reducing America’s military presence in East Asia, leaving China free to pursue its dreams of regional – and continental – dominance.

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If it unfolds as hoped, Trump’s new deal with the North Korean leader would provide some substance to a foreign policy platform that has thus far been more about tearing down the achievements of his predecessors.

A first-ever meeting between a US and North Korean leader is bound to raise expectations, but the gap in demands is too wide to be resolved in one go and tough bargaining lies ahead

A peace treaty could relieve the Korean peninsula of its tensions, and a series of confidence- and trust-building measures could produce denuclearisation and end the need for the UN command there. The process, however, would almost certainly be gradual

The Trump administration has built expectations to extraordinary heights for a single summit with Kim Jong-un, when the most effective agreements are the product of a laborious process.