South Korea’s President Lee Jae Myung urges President Donald Trump to ease sanctions on North Korea in exchange for a halt to the country’s weapons development. In an interview, Lee says he sees “significant value” in linking sanctions relief to North Korea freezing its nuclear and weapons programs.
Lee’s proposal departs from past approaches in which sanctions policy has typically been tied to broader denuclearization goals rather than a narrower freeze. He also frames the exchange as one where Trump should require North Korea to pause, not eliminate, its nuclear program. The Hill and The New York Times both report the central point of Lee’s message: sanctions relief would be conditioned on verifiable steps that stop or freeze development activities.
