North Korean chief Kim Jong-un stands for a photograph whereas visiting the headquarters of the eleventh Corps of the Korean Folks’s Military on Nov. 1, 2025. (KCNA/Yonhap)
The Nationwide Intelligence Service mentioned on Tuesday that there’s a excessive likelihood {that a} US-North Korea summit will occur within the not-so-distant future.
The service has reportedly concluded that North Korea could pursue a summit with the US someday round March of subsequent 12 months, across the time of South Korea-US joint army coaching workouts.
Throughout an audit by the Nationwide Meeting’s Intelligence Committee on the NIS headquarters in Seoul’s Seocho District, officers from the spy company informed lawmakers that North Korean chief Kim Jong-un is prepared to interact in dialogue with the US, and that they believe North Korea will attain out to the US if the circumstances are proper.
The officers predicted that such an occasion would happen someday following South Korea’s allied army drills with the US, scheduled for March.
In a press briefing after the audit listening to, Park Solar-won, a Democratic Occasion lawmaker and vice chairperson of the Nationwide Meeting Intelligence Committee, mentioned, “Based on the NIS, North Korea has its eyes on subsequent 12 months as a time to achieve out to the US.”
Park supplied three causes the NIS had arrived at this conclusion. First, after US President Donald Trump indicated that he’s open to dialogue with North Korea, North Korean Overseas Minister Choe Son-hui reconsidered her scheduled go to to Russia. Second, North Korea is taking pains to investigate the proclivities of individuals chargeable for North Korea coverage throughout the Trump administration. Lastly, Kim Jong-un has been firming down his rhetoric on nuclear weapons currently. Park says that these developments present that North Korea has its sights on talks with the US.
Lee Jong-seok, the director of the Nationwide Intelligence Service, attends a parliamentary audit on the service’s places of work in Seoul’s Seocho District on Nov. 4, 2025. (pool picture)
There was additionally a report on North Korea’s transfer to replicate Kim Jong-un’s place that the 2 Koreas are “two states hostile to one another” within the North Korean structure.
Seoul’s spy company reportedly mentioned that intelligence means that North Korea is making ready to carry a army parade in February, forward of a gathering of the ninth Congress of the Employees’ Occasion of Korea. After the congress, the Supreme Folks’s Meeting is more likely to convene, and there’s a excessive likelihood that Kim Jong-un’s stance that South and North Korea are two separate, hostile nations will probably be mirrored within the North Korean structure at the moment.
The NIS additionally reportedly has seen indicators of extra North Korean troop deployments to Ukraine.
The NIS mentioned that the ten,000 North Korean troops deployed had been dispatched all alongside the Ukrainian entrance and are at the moment serving as guards. A further 1,000 troops have been assigned to mine-removal responsibility, whereas 5,000 troops in a building unit are being transported in phases to Russia, the spy company mentioned.
Park mentioned that the NIS had reported detecting steady actions to coach and recruit troops for added deployments.
Concerning the findings of a particular audit into suspicions that South Korean President Lee Jae Myung despatched cash to North Korea via an organization named Ssangbangwool, Park Solar-won mentioned that the spy company discovered there to be “no connection” between Kim Seong-tae, the previous Ssangbangwool chairman, and Lee.
“There was no affirmation in anyway that cash flowed into North Korea whereas President Lee was the governor of Gyeonggi,” he added.
Concerning the particular audit into suspicions surrounding the 2020 loss of life of a South Korean civil servant within the West Sea, he mentioned, “Park Jie-won, who was head of the NIS on the time, didn’t give any orders to delete something within the report he acquired from the Protection Safety Company. The report continues to be obtainable within the state’s digital archives, the place you’ll be able to learn it.”
By Kim Chae-woon, employees reporter
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