North Korea: Mike Pompeo visits Pyongyang ahead of nuclear summit

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo held meetings with top North Korean officials in Pyongyang to prepare a US-North Korea nuclear summit.

He is expected to return with three US detainees and details of the upcoming summit between leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump.

"We expect him to bring the date, time and the captives," South Korean Yonhap news agency cited a unnamed local official as saying. 

Pompeo told North Korean officials that the US is committed to working with North Korea to achieve peace on the Korean peninsula.
"I have high expectations the United States will play a very big role in establishing peace on the Korean peninsula," said Kim Yong-chol, director of the United Front Department responsible for North-South relations.
Pompeo said the officials he met were equally committed for the same goal.
Trump told reporters that he hoped a deal could be reached to establish long-term peace with North Korea.
"We think relationships are building with North Korea," Trump said in televised comments from the White House. "Hopefully, a deal will happen and, with the help of China, South Korea, and Japan, a future of great prosperity and security can be achieved for everyone."
Pompeo said he hoped North Korea would release three Americans imprisoned in the country. "We've been asking for the release of these detainees for 17 months," he said.
One of the detainees, Kim Dong-chul, a pastor in his 60s, was detained in 2015 for spying charges and sentenced to 10 years of labour in 2016.
The other two have been imprisoned since 2017. Tony Kim, a Korean-American lecturer, was detained on espionage charges in April 2017. A month later, Kim Hak-song, a Christian missionary, was held on suspicion of "hostile acts".
Their imprisonment has been widely criticised as political and an abuse of human rights, and their potential release is considered a gesture of goodwill ahead of the summit.
This is Pompeo's second visit to North Korea in six weeks. The US secratary of state met Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang in April, when he was still director of the CIA.
Last month, Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae-in confirmed their commitment to "complete denuclearisation".