Donald Trump threatens Kim Jong Un with same fate as Gaddafi if he backs out of nuclear talks

Donald Trump has warned Kim Jong Un that he will suffer the same fate as Libyan leader Mummar Gaddafi if he backs away from an agreement over its nuclear programme.

The US President made the threat after he was asked about a recent suggestion that the “Libyan model” will be used as template for dealing with North Korea.

Speaking to reporters at the White House on Thursday, Mr Trump said a “much different” model would be used if the rogue state’s leader makes good at talks in Singapore on June 12.

He said: “The Libyan model was a much different model. We decimated that country. We never said to Gaddafi, ‘Oh, we're going to give you protection’.”

Questions have been raised over Kim Jong Un's planned meeting with Donald Trump
AFP/Getty Images

“We went in and decimated him, and we did the same thing with Iraq.” The US leader added: “But if we make a deal, I think Kim Jong-Un is going to be very, very happy.”

His comments appeared to suggest that the North Korea regime’s survival could be assured if Kim agreed to dismantle his nuclear weapons programme.

North Korea claimed it was angered over a joint US-South Korea military exercise, but some suggested Pyongyang was returning to the kind of diplomacy it displayed before the talks were proposed

A statement published by the state-run Korea Central News Agency said North Korea would never accept economic assistance from the US in exchange for unilaterally abandoning its nuclear programme.

“We have never had any expectation of US support in carrying out our economic construction and will not … Make such a deal in future,” the statement read.

Mr Trump was asked about comments made over the weekend by his national security adviser, John Bolton, who raised the prospect of pursuing a “Libya model”.

Mr Bolton was referring to an announcement made by Mr Gaddafi in December 2003, when he announced he was giving up his WMD programme and seeking better relations with the West after the US and UK invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Mr Trump appeared to have confused that process of what happened to the Libyan leader in 2011 when he was overthrown and killed after Libyans joined the Arab Spring protests, and were supported militarily by Nato.

He was hunted down and killed by opponents in Sirte, after his convoy was struck by Nato planes.

Hillary Clinton, who was then the US secretary of state, said of his death: “We came, we saw, he died.”

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