Trump says summit with Kim to take place in Hanoi

Washington: US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will meet for a second much-anticipated summit in Hanoi, as preparations kick into high gear for the peace talks.

Trump announced the exact location on Twitter -- only the country, Vietnam, was previously known -- for the follow-on to the leaders´ summit in Singapore last year as he hailed "very productive" preparatory talks between diplomats from the two countries.

"My representatives have just left North Korea after a very productive meeting and an agreed upon time and date for the second Summit with Kim Jong Un," Trump said.

"It will take place in Hanoi, Vietnam, on February 27 & 28. I look forward to seeing Chairman Kim & advancing the cause of peace!"

The US State Department said the special US envoy for North Korea will meet again with Pyongyang officials ahead of the Trump-Kim talks -- hours after he returned to Seoul from talks in the North on the summit´s agenda.

In a statement, the State Department said talks during Stephen Biegun´s three-day trip explored Trump and Kim´s "commitments of complete denuclearization, transforming US-DPRK relations and building a lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula."

Biegun landed at Osan US Air Base late Friday, foreign ministry spokesman Noh Kyu-duk told AFP.

The State Department confirmed Biegun agreed to meet his North Korean counterpart Kim Hyok Chol again before the leaders´ talks.

North Korea has yet to provide any official confirmation of the summit and Kim Jong Un appeared to make no mention of it during a meeting earlier with the top brass of the Korean People´s Army.

As reported by state media, the meeting focused on the need to modernize the military while maintaining party discipline in the ranks.