KYODO NEWS - Nov 4, 2019 - 22:00 | World, All

South Korea's spy agency said Monday that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is aiming to hold a summit meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump by the end of the year, according to parliamentary sources.

According to a lawmaker who attended a closed-door briefing, the agency has intelligence that working-level talks could be held by early December toward realization of the meeting.

The two leaders have held three rounds of face-to-face talks so far, the most recent being in June at the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas. They agreed to restart the stalled talks on North Korea's denuclearization and invited each other to visit their capital cities.

In a speech he gave in April to his country's top legislature, Kim urged the United States to shift its stance in nuclear talks by the end of this year, criticizing Washington for making what he claimed are one-sided demands.

At working-level dialogue on denuclearization last month in Stockholm, Pyongyang's nuclear envoy said that the U.S. side came to the negotiations "empty-handed," indicating that the talks broke down.

The National Intelligence Service also revealed that Kim Pyong Il, North Korea's top envoy to the Czech Republic, will soon be replaced and return home.

Kim Pyong Il is the younger paternal half-brother of late North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, the current leader's father.

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