It is the first time Kim has mentioned Trump by name since the U.S. president’s inauguration in January, said Rachel Minyoung Lee, a North Korea expert with the U.S.-based Stimson Center. “Based on that, we can proceed to medium-term negotiations for nuclear weapons reductions, and in the long run, once mutual trust is restored and North Korea’s regime-security concerns are reduced, we can pursue denuclearisation,” he said. “The world already knows full well what the United States does after it makes a country give up its nuclear weapons and disarms,” Kim said. North Korea has been under U.N. sanctions and arms embargoes since its first nuclear test in 2006. But while the sanctions have squeezed funding for military development, Pyongyang has continued to make advances in building nuclear weapons and powerful ballistic missiles.