Statement Issued by Advisor of DPRK Foreign Ministry

Pyongyang, January 11 (KCNA) -- Kim Kye Gwan, advisor of the DPRK Foreign Ministry, issued the following statement on Saturday:

From the outset of this year, the south Korean authorities have become too busy, talking about urgent conveying of the U.S. president's birthday greetings to the Chairman of our State Affairs Commission.

This is what the U.S. president asked for to be surely conveyed to the Chairman when he met the person concerned of Chongwadae in Washington, the south Korean authorities said in an extremely urgent notice they sent. But they seem not to know that there is a special liaison channel between the top leaders of the DPRK and the U.S.

The birthday greetings from the U.S. president that reached us by care of the excited south Korean authorities through the notice is what we already got through the personal letter of the U.S. president.

South Korea, not a member of the U.S. clan, went so frivolous as to convey the greetings from the U.S. president. It seems it still has lingering hope for playing the role of "mediator" in the DPRK-U.S. relations.

To forge personal relations between heads of state is a diplomatically natural thing between states. However, it is somehow presumptuous for south Korea to meddle in the personal relations between Chairman of the State Affairs Commission Kim Jong Un and President Trump.

As acknowledged by the world, it is true that the personal relations between the Chairman of our State Affairs Commission and President Trump are not bad.

But, it is absentminded to think of either making us return to the dialogue with the U.S. by taking the advantage of such relations or creating an atmosphere for it.

We have been deceived by the U.S., being caught in the dialogue with it for over one year and a half, and that was the lost time for us.

Although Chairman Kim Jong Un has a good personal feelings about President Trump, they are, in the true sense of the word, "personal". The Chairman of the State Affairs Commission would not discuss the state affairs on the basis of such personal feelings, as he represents our state and its interests.

What is clear is that we will never lose our time again, being taken in by the U.S. trick as in the past.

There will never be such negotiations as that in Vietnam, in which we proposed exchanging a core nuclear facility of the country for the lift of some UN sanctions in a bid to lessen the sufferings of the peaceable people even a bit.

There is no need for us to be present in such talks, in which there is only unilateral pressure, and we have no desire to barter something for other thing at the talks like traders.

It can be said that the reopening of dialogue between the DPRK and the U.S. may be possible only under the condition of the latter's absolute agreement on the issues raised by the former, but we know well that the U.S. is neither ready nor able to do so.

We know well about the way we should go and will go on our way.

Under these circumstances, the south Korean authorities had better not dream a fabulous dream that we would return to the dialogue with thankful feelings for the birthday greetings like someone. They are well advised to behave prudently not to be reduced to a fool heading nowhere. -0-