Working level talks between North Korea and the U.S. could be held in the coming weeks.
That's according to Seoul's top intel agency, which believes Pyeongyang has plans to hold its third summit with Washington in December.
Kim Mok-yeon starts us off.
South Korea's National Intelligence Service said that working-level denuclearization talks between North Korea and the U.S. could be held in the coming weeks, hinting at the possibility of a third Pyeongyang-Washington summit in December.
After attending a closed-door parliamentary audit of the intelligence agency on Monday, main opposition Liberty Korea Party lawmaker Lee Eun-jae quoted intel chief Suh Hoon... as saying that working-level discussions between Pyeongyang and Washington could be held as soon as this month or as late as early December.
She said the NIS expects talks to resume around then, since the two sides have already gained an understanding of each other's perspectives through last month's working-level talks in Stockholm. In addition, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has previously mentioned intentions to hold negotiations by the end of this year.
The NIS also suggested Kim might go to China this year.
According to Lee, the intel agency says Kim is making plans to visit China in line with the 70th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations between Pyeongyang and Beijing.
The agency also touched upon the precedent of Kim visiting China before his first and second summits with U.S. President Trump, and said that they are looking into that possibility should the working-level negotiations between Pyeongyang and Washington go smoothly.
On the North's missile capability, the NIS said the regime launched its recent intercontinental ballistic missiles from mobile launchers.
The agency says it's also keeping close tabs on whether Pyeongyang could test fire a missile from a new submarine being built at the Sinpo shipyard on its east coast, which the intelligence body predicts to be in the final stages of construction.
Kim Mok-yeon, Arirang News.
