Basically, Trump is canceling the summit because of the “tremendous anger and open hostility” North Korea displayed recently, to Pence and threatening to cancel the summit itself.

Here’s the background to all that:

1. As Trump officials said they wanted North Korea to totally dismantle their nuclear capabilities, North Korea had appeared to waver about whether it was going to participate in the meeting with Trump.

2. In response, Trump White House officials started comparing North Korea to Libya, a country that dismantled its nascent nuclear program. It’s an ominous one for North Korea: That same leader ended up dead less than a decade later after a civil war in which the U.S. got militarily involved.

3. As North Korea escalated suggestions it might not participate in the summit, Trump officials doubled down. In a Fox News interview this week, Vice President Pence said North Korea would “end like the Libya model ended” if Kim backed out of the meeting with Trump. Asked if he was threatening Kim, Pence said: “I think it’s more of a fact.”

 

1. In response, North Korea’s Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs said Pence’s comments were “stupid” and “ignorant” and called him a “political dummy.”

2. Also this week, Trump threatened to back out of the summit if North Korea did not meet “certain conditions.” He did not elaborate on what those conditions were, reports The Post’s Anna Fifield.

3. North Korea issued a statement in response saying it’s up to the United States to “meet us at a meeting room or encounter us at nuclear-to-nuclear showdown.”

4. Now the summit is canceled, with Trump citing “tremendous anger and open hostility” on North Korea’s part.

North Korea has cancelled Wednesday's high-level talks with South Korea because of anger over its joint military exercises with the US.

The North's official KCNA news agency said the exercises were a "provocation" and a rehearsal for an invasion.

It also warned the US over the fate of the historic summit between Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump that is scheduled for 12 June in Singapore. (...)

(...) Kim's news agency said that the leader would "open-heartedly" discuss with Moon "all the issues arising in improving inter-Korean relations and achieving peace, prosperity and reunification of the Korean peninsula" in a "historic" summit. It's the first time one of the ruling Kim leaders has crossed over to the southern side of the Demilitarized Zone since the Korean War ended in 1953.

The greeting of the two leaders was planned to the last detail. Thousands of journalists were kept in a huge conference center well away from the summit, except for a small group of tightly-controlled pool reporters at the border. Moon stood near the Koreas' dividing line, moving forward the moment he glimpsed Kim appearing in front of a building on the northern side. They shook hands with the border line between them. Moon then invited Kim to cross into the South; Kim invited Moon into the North, and they then took a ceremonial photo facing the North and then another photo facing the South. (...)