China may be ‘getting in our way’ on North Korea, says Trump

Bloomberg

US President Donald Trump suggested China is obstructing nuclear talks with North Korea as the world’s two biggest economies tussle over trade.
Trump’s remark at a political rally on Wednesday in Tampa, Florida, was the latest sign of friction between the US and North Korea, as they attempt to implement on Kim’s June 12 agreement to “work towards complete denuclearisation.” The president made the claim during a long defense of his trade war with China.
“We are doing well in North Korea, although I happen to think that we’re doing so well with China that China maybe is getting in our way,” Trump said, noting that Kim has continued to refrain from launching missiles. “No tests. No rockets flying. We’ll see what happens.” Trump didn’t provide details on how China was interfering in the nuclear talks.
It wasn’t the first time Trump has suggested that China was relaxing pressure on North Korea amid the simmering trade dispute. After his summit with Kim in Singapore, Trump acknowledged that his trade disputes could discourage Chinese President Xi Jinping’s cooperation, saying “the border is more open than it was when we first started.”
Besides being the US’s largest trading partner, China is arguably the most important player in Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign to force Kim to give up his nuclear arsenal. After
an April 2017 meeting at
the president’s Mar-a-Lago home, Xi supported successive rounds of United Nations sanctions and clamped down on border trade with North Korea.