Kim’s train chugs 4,000 km for Hanoi summit with Trump

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ANKARA (AA) – In the runup to this week’s summit with U.S. President Donald Trump, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un boarded a train to travel from Pyongyang to the site of the meeting in Vietnam.

According to state Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), Kim left the North Korean capital to make the 4,000-kilometer journey to Hanoi on Saturday afternoon, accompanied by trusted aides, including his sister.

For his part, Trump is due to fly to the capital Hanoi on Monday evening.

At the second summit between the two countries on Wednesday and Thursday, Trump and Kim are expected to take forward the agenda of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula and lifting sanctions from Pyongyang, as discussed at the historic Singapore summit last June.

Vietnam said it was ready to welcome the U.S. and Korean leaders. On Saturday, the country’s Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc inspected preparations ahead of the summit, daily Vietnam News reported.

Korean news agency Yonhap reported that the special train carrying Kim arrived in the central Chinese town of Changsha on Monday on its way to Vietnam.

Vietnamese authorities have tightened security as Kim's train is expected to cross the border into the northern Vietnamese border town of Dong Dang on Tuesday. “From there, the North Korean leader will likely travel by car to Hanoi,” the report said.

“Traffic will be banned on a section of highway linking the city to Hanoi between 6 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Tuesday, and the Vietnamese military did a mine sweep of the road,” it added.