Trump and Kim to Meet on Singapore's Sentosa Island Resort
The two leaders would start their meeting at 9 a.m. Singapore time on June 12, the White House said.
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will hold their historic Singapore summit at the Capella Hotel on the city-state’s Sentosa Island, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday on Twitter.
The Trump administration has slowly revealed details of the meeting, which the president canceled last month only to reinstate days later. On Monday, the White House said the two leaders would start their meeting at 9 a.m. Singapore time on June 12.
Hosting the historic meeting between Trump and Kim represents a diplomatic coup for Singapore, which lies almost 5,000 kilometers (3,000 miles) south of the North Korean capital, Pyongyang. The location offers excellent security, a track record of putting together top-level international gatherings and long-standing ties with North Korea.
Trump aims to persuade the North Korean dictator to give up his country’s nuclear arsenal in exchange for relief from U.S. economic sanctions. He’s promised American investment in the under-developed country would follow.
The U.S. campaign to economically isolate North Korea will continue even as preparations for the summit advance, Sanders said Monday, adding there has been no change in what Trump has described as a “maximum pressure” campaign on North Korea.
The Singapore government issued a public order establishing special zones around both the Shangri-La and Capella hotels from June 10 to June 14. Anyone entering the zones will be required to comply with strict conditions and drones will be prohibited from flying in the areas.
The Capella sits in the middle of 30 acres of lawns and rain forest on Sentosa Island, a resort area just south of the city.
Kim Chang Son, director of North Korea’s state affairs commission secretariat, and Joe Hagin, a deputy White House chief of staff, met at the hotel in late May to work out security and logistics measures.
The 112 rooms and villas were designed by British architect Norman Foster. A curving wood and glass structure wraps around restored colonial buildings that once included an officers’ mess for Britain’s Royal Artillery. The regimental silver is rumored to have been buried under the lawn before Japanese troops captured Singapore in 1942.
To contact the reporter on this story: Keith Zhai in Singapore at qzhai4@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Daniel Ten Kate at dtenkate@bloomberg.net, Mike Dorning, Joshua Gallu
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