[Sesay:] More now on our breaking news. U.S. President Donald Trump has agreed to meet directly with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. We don't know where just yet. But South Korean officials say the face- to-face meeting will happen by May. The White House says sanctions and pressure on North Korea will remain in place and the stunning announcement came after a South Korean delegation met with Mr. Kim in Pyongyang earlier this week, then traveled to Washington to deliver the invitation to Mr. Trump.
[Chung Eui-yong, South Korean National Security Adviser:] North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said he's committed to denuclearization. Kim pledged that North Korea will refrain from any further nuclear or missile tests and he expressed his eagerness to meet President Trump as soon as possible. President Trump appreciated the briefing and said he would meet Kim Jong-un by May to achieve permanent denuclearization.
[Sesay:] CNN's Andrew Stevens is live in Seoul and joins us. Andrew, as the world processes the news that President Trump is set to meet Kim Jong-un, we're hearing that the man in the middle of all of this, South Korea's president Moon Jae-in, has described the upcoming meeting as almost miraculous. And it's kind of hard to disagree with him.
[Andrew Stevens, Cnn Asia Pacific Editor:] It is. If you think of just a few short months ago, Isha, the amount of rhetoric coming from both North Korea and the U.S. and the level of tension on the Korean Peninsula, the threats of military action by the U.S., the threats of retaliation, missile strikes, nuclear tests, you name it. And now we have, in the space of a week, not one but two summits. The key summit obviously the U.S. and North Korea, which most people thought this would not happen, certainly not for long time, at least. President Moon, as you said, described the meeting as almost miraculous and also thanking President Trump and Kim Jong-un for making it possible. It's important to remember here that this is a big win for Kim as well because both his father and his grandfather had also been pushing for meetings with the United States leader and, for various reasons, they all fell apart. This one is going through. The question, of course, is why Kim is pushing this completely different policy when we say than just a few months ago. It seems to be the reason is sanctions. We can't say definitely because we still haven't heard anything official from North Korea on this whole process. The only thing we've seen from North Korea are the pictures. So we can't say definitely it's sanctions, Isha, but certainly if you look at the anecdotal evidence, everything points to the fact that the North Korean economy was being squeezed. It was going to be squeezed harder as more and more sanctions came into force. And Kim, who's looking at his longevity, sees this as a best way forward. And Donald Trump representing the best U.S. president, if you like, to actually agree to a meeting. Trump likes to pride himself on the art of a deal being a businessman, making executive decisions. Well, he certainly made an executive decision today on that. The South Koreans weren't even scheduled to meet him but they did meet him, explaining what the Kim offer was, which is a verbal, not a written offer. And Trump pretty much agreed on the spot, catching his advisers completely off guard as well. And this obviously is what Kim had been hoping for. It is said that he studies Trump very closely and he played to Trump in some ways. And this is the result. Whether something comes out of it, that is the $64,000 question. Kim is still putting conditions on this, this denuclearization offer. So whether the U.S. is prepared to agree to the conditions, that's the big one, obviously.
[Sesay:] $64,000 question, Andrew, I think it's worth a bit more than that, this one. The question has to be, where are they going to meet? I mean, because this is not just a simple question of you know, just pick a spot. It carries significance, it sends a message, the optics are important.
[Stevens:] Absolutely, the optics are incredibly important in this. There's three potential places and maybe a fourth we don't know about yet, is Pyongyang. It's the DMZ, the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea, and there's Washington. It's very difficult to see a U.S. president going to Pyongyang. That would be giving too much face to North Korea, which I just don't see that happening. The a meeting in Washington, would Kim Jong-un be prepared to go to Washington? That's debatable. We have heard reports from Washington that it's probably not a starter, either, which leaves the DMZ. We know there's a summit there in April between the leaders of North and South Korea and we know that Donald Trump has said that the meeting with Kim Jong- un will take place by May. So maybe the DMZ is the place to do it. It really is a momentum game at the moment, given that five days ago, Isha, all we knew that was two senior level enjoys were going to Pyongyang to talk to Kim Jong- un. We had no idea or we certainly weren't told what they were going to be talking about. Five days later, we've got these two big summits. So it's momentum at the moment. So I expect we'll find out fairly soon, given the unorthodox style of Donald Trump so far on this whole issue, fairly soon where the Americans want that summit. And I suspect it will be in the DMZ, you know, which has face.
[Sesay:] Everyone looking at this very closely, particularly those in the region; I'm thinking specifically Beijing and Tokyo. Give me a sense of how they view the road ahead. Obviously Beijing wanted these talks sooner rather than later. Japan a little bit more circumspect and concerned and part of that concern may be a sense that they're being left on the sidelines. Talk to me about the regional perspective on this.
[Stevens:] There has been a concern in Tokyo that events were perhaps getting ahead of them. It's important to note here as well that Japan and the U.S. and South Korea are in lockstep on the fact that the sanctions, this maximum pressure that Donald Trump talks about, the U.S. strategy towards North is maintained. All three countries are in total agreement on that. Now with Beijing, their longstanding position on the whole nuclearization and the tensions on the Korean Peninsula is that dialogue is the only way forward. They've suggested this freeze for freeze, that the U.S. would freeze, for example, the military drills and, in return, the North Koreans would freeze the missile tests. So we've gone way beyond that. But certainly the bottom line for Beijing has always been about negotiations. Japan has welcomed this and Japan is also very cautious. They point continually to the fact that we have been down this path before, there has been overtures made from North Korea and to North Korea and none of them have actually led to anything. At the 11th hour, the North Koreans have moved back from any sort of denuclearization at all and kept with that nuclear program because remember, Isha, this is fundamental, it's written in the constitution. Nuclear deterrent equals regime survival. It's always been thus in North Korea. Has that changed?
[Sesay:] That is the I'm going to raise you. I'm going to go that's the million-dollar question. Andrew Stevens, joining us there in Seoul, South Korea, appreciate it.
[Stevens:] A billion.
[Sesay:] Yes, exactly. Thank you, appreciate it, Andrew. A story we'll continue to follow for you. Also, that storm that's brewing over the White House; coming up, how the Trump administration is dealing with the latest developments in the Stormy Daniels saga.