With a handshake, President Trump and Kim Jong Un made history Tuesday morning in the first meeting between a sitting U.S. president and the head of the North Korean regime.
When President Trump and Kim Jong Un meet on Tuesday, it will be the result of strenuous diplomacy by officials from the U.S., North Korea and other countries. Here are some of the key figures.
President Trump doesn't speak Korean and little is known about Kim Jong Un's English skills. The best interpreters serve as both linguists and diplomats. They understand the politics behind the words.
President Trump says he expects to know quickly whether North Korea is serious about surrendering its nuclear weapons. But Pyongyang has fooled the U.S. in the past.
"No regime has oppressed its own citizens more totally or brutally than the cruel dictatorship of North Korea," the president said in January. Human rights experts fear the issue may be ignored now.
The Trump administration's terms for North Korea's denuclearization verge on the impossible, some former negotiators say: "There's no way of doing something that's irreversible, that I know of."
Schumer, D-N.Y., and other top Democrats sent a letter to President Trump yesterday, laying out tough demands ahead of Trump's summit with North Korea. He talks about them with NPR's Rachel Martin.
President Trump says his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is back on for June 12 in Singapore. The announcement follows a White House meeting with Kim's top deputy Kim Yong Chol.