SEOUL, June 17 - South Korean President Lee Jae Myung used a short exchange with former U.S. President Donald Trump at the Group of Seven leaders' photo session to request U.S. leadership in seeking a peaceful outcome to tensions with North Korea, Lee's office said.
According to the presidential spokesperson Kang Yu-jung, the two leaders greeted each other during the leaders' group photograph, and Trump inquired about the current state of relations with North Korea. At that moment, Lee asked Trump to take the lead in efforts to resolve the North Korea issue peacefully - citing the kind of leadership the office said Trump had exercised in addressing the war in the Middle East.
Kang quoted Trump as responding that he would work to address the North Korea issue.
The brief interaction comes against the backdrop of earlier direct diplomacy between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. During Trump's first term, the two held three meetings: a landmark summit in Singapore in 2018, a second summit in Hanoi in 2019, and a later 2019 meeting at the Demilitarized Zone between the two Koreas where Trump became the first sitting U.S. president to step into North Korea.
Those diplomatic efforts broke down after the Hanoi summit failed to produce an agreement on dismantling North Korea's nuclear programme and on easing U.S.-led sanctions, the presidential office noted.
In recent public remarks, Trump has continued to signal interest in reviving direct diplomacy with Kim. He said in August 2025 that he looked forward to seeing the North Korean leader "in the appropriate future," and in October said he would "love" to meet Kim again. Separately, Trump last week posted a captionless photograph of himself with Kim Jong Un on Truth Social, which served as a reminder of their prior meetings.
The exchange at the G7 photo line was brief and limited to the leaders' greetings and a short conversation; Lee's office provided the account of the content of that conversation.