U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi, Vietnam, Feb. 28, 2019 (AP photo by Evan Vucci).

North Korea sanctions were back in the news last week. On Thursday, the United States Treasury Department announced economic penalties on two Chinese shipping companies for breaching United Nations sanctions on Pyongyang. That announcement was seemingly reversed Friday by President Donald Trump, who said on Twitter that he would be rescinding newly announced Treasury Department sanctions against North Korea. After some confusion, the White House explained that Trump was referring to as-yet unannounced U.S. unilateral sanctions, highlighting the administration’s lack of coordination on key messaging with regard to North Korea. Observers could be forgiven for seeing the mix-up as an […]

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and U.S. President Donald Trump at the G-20 summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Dec. 1, 2018 (Photo by Ralf Hirschberger for dpa via AP Images).

One thing the Cold War taught the United States was how important it is, whenever possible, to address security threats without using force. American leaders knew that almost any military action risked confrontation with the Soviet Union and potential escalation to nuclear war. So armed conflicts had to be kept limited, and the two superpowers instead sought to use nonmilitary means to deal with adversaries. The United States learned during the Cold War to rely on economic and political power, reserving military action for deterrence and for addressing serious threats that could not be handled any other way. American leaders […]

Anti-Brexit campaigners’ placards outside Parliament, London, Jan. 28, 2019 (Photo by Kirsty O’Connor for EMPPL PA Wire via AP Images).

In this week’s editors’ discussion episode of Trend Lines, WPR’s editor-in-chief Judah Grunstein, managing editor Frederick Deknatel and associate editor Elliot Waldman look at British Prime Minister Theresa May’s latest Brexit setback, the Trump administration’s latest policy shift on Israel, and the United Nations Security Council’s latest report on North Korea sanctions noncompliance. If you like what you hear on Trend Lines and what you’ve read on WPR, you can sign up for our free newsletter to get our uncompromising analysis delivered straight to your inbox. The newsletter offers a free preview article every day of the week, plus three […]

South Korean President Moon Jae-in arrives at Phnom Penh International Airport, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, March 14, 2019 (AP photo by Heng Sinith).

When President Donald Trump stunned the world last year by agreeing to hold a summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un—the first-ever meeting between an American president and a North Korean head of state—it felt like a punch in the gut to South Korean conservatives. Hard-liners on North Korea, they were already roiling from corruption scandals that had brought down President Park Geun-hye with massive protests in 2016 and led to the election of President Moon Jae-in. Now, after Trump’s abrupt decision late last month to walk out of talks with North Korea during his second summit with Kim, he […]

President Donald Trump speaks as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo looks on during a news conference after a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Hanoi, Vietnam, Feb. 28, 2019 (AP photo by Evan Vucci).

Donald Trump is not the first American president to run into a brick wall trying to negotiate away North Korea’s nuclear weapons capability. President Bill Clinton thought he had a deal in 1994, known as the Agreed Framework, to end the nuclear threat posed by Kim Il Sung’s dynasty. But the regime of his son, Kim Jong Il, continually demanded new concessions for complying, while secretly exploiting every loophole in the agreement to continue its nuclear activities. President George W. Bush ultimately rejected that deal as unworkable and tightened sanctions. North Korea’s response was to withdraw from the Nuclear Nonproliferation […]

U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un after their first meeting at the Sofitel Legend Metropole hotel, Hanoi, Vietnam, Feb. 28, 2019 (AP photo by Evan Vucci).

The world was riveted this week by the meeting in Hanoi between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. Last year’s initial summit between the two leaders in Singapore created nearly giddy hope for an end to the longstanding hostility between the United States and North Korea, particularly the resolution of the thorniest issue of all: North Korea’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program. But a true breakthrough in Vietnam was always unlikely for one pressing reason: Americans persistently fail to understand how Kim sees the world, instead treating him as they want him to be, rather […]

A visitor walks past a door of a palace from the Kingdom of Dahomey in present-day Benin, on display in the Quai Branly museum, Paris, Nov. 23, 2018 (AP photo by Michel Euler).

In this week’s Trend Lines podcast, WPR’s editor-in-chief, Judah Grunstein, and managing editor, Frederick Deknatel, discuss U.S. President Donald Trump’s failed second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Vietnam. For the Report, Ayodeji Rotinwa talks with WPR’s senior editor, Robbie Corey-Boulet, about how the global debate over the fate of African art and artifacts, including the fabled Benin Bronzes, is playing out in Nigeria. If you like what you hear on Trend Lines and what you’ve read on WPR, you can sign up for our free newsletter to get our uncompromising analysis delivered straight to your inbox. […]