As the trade war between China and the United States rage on, several reports claiming that the Asian superpower is seriously considering to ease up some of its sanctions against North Korea were recently published. Many analysts said that should U.S. President Donald Trump continues to push China to the side, China might want to reevaluate its stance against one of the biggest threat to the United States: North Korea.
One of the first proponents of this idea is Eurasia Group director for Asia operations Scott Seaman. Mr. Seaman said that the more President Trump bully China in the economic front, it might drive China to cooperate less with North Korea.
Mr. Seaman noted that China has already made some steps in relaxing the enforcement of some of its sanctions against North Korea way before the trade war started. However, as the trade war continues to hurt the economies of both nations, China could be persuaded to look for alternative reasons in order to relax its enforcement of North Korean sanctions.
This is not the first time China is suggesting to ease up sanctions against North Korea. China, along with Russia, has flaunted this possibility to the United Nations in September.
China and the United States are currently embroiled in a bitter trade war that has seen more than $250 billion worth of tariffs slapped against various Chinese goods. President Trump even threatens to hike up the tariff to reach $500 billion. As part of its retaliatory strategy, China, in turn, imposed $110 billion worth of tariff against American imports.
Regarding North Korea, the hermetic state has recently held talks with South Korea and the United Nations Command on Tuesday. This is the first three-way talks involving the three parties. The main topic of the talk is to discuss ways on how to demilitarize the border which is dividing the two Koreas.
After the meeting in the United Nations, North Korea's state-owned media released a scathing criticism of President Trump claiming that he is blocking the progress made between the two Koreas. The state-owned media also accused the United States of "responding to good faith with evil."
Mr. Seaman said that despite the highly positive talks in Singapore between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, North Korea still had not fulfilled its promise of denuclearization. Mr. Seaman added that the world is still waiting for North Korea to begin the process of disarming its nuclear arsenal.
