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North Korean Ministers Choe Son-hui, Deputy Foreign Minister and Ri Yong-ho, Head of Diplomacy, at their press conference in Hanoi, March 1, 2019. Yonhap / via REUTERS

A few hours after the end of the summit in Hanoi between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un, which ended on Thursday, February 28 without agreement between the two leaders, the head of the North Korean diplomacy addressed the press. He denied the US President's statement that Pyongyang demanded a total lifting of sanctions imposed on the country because of its banned nuclear and ballistic programs.

With our special correspondent in Hanoi, Stéphane Lagarde

Despite the rain, the spirits are warming up among the South Korean confreres. It is past midnight in front of the Melia hotel in Hanoi, eleven hours after the failed summit negotiations between Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump, and the North Korean delegation has just improvised a press conference.

Ponchos and umbrellas jostle on the metal barriers, not everyone can go home. Inside, dark suit, pin of North Korean leaders in the buttonhole, Ri Yong-ho, the North Korean Foreign Minister accuses Washington of having failed the negotiations.

" During the meeting, the United States insisted that we go further than dismantling the Yongbyon site, " he said. From that moment, it became clear that the United States refused our proposals. It is not sure that such an opportunity is represented. "

The North Korean diplomacy claims to have proposed the freeze of all its tests against the exemption on five sanctions regimes for North Korea. " By rejecting our proposal, the United States is missing an opportunity that only comes every 1,000 years, " said Choe Son-hui, deputy foreign minister.

At a press conference before leaving Vietnam, the US president blamed disappointed hopes for North Korea's sanctions requirements.