Trump applauded North Korea's leader after floating the possibility of a 'major, major' conflict in the region
(U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during an interview with Reuters in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, U.S., April 27, 2017.REUTERS/Carlos Barria)
President Donald Trump appeared to commend North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's ability to control his country.
"Not many 27-year-old men could go in and take over a regime," Trump said in a Reuters interview published Thursday night. "Say what you want, but that's not easy — especially at that age."
"I'm just telling you, and I'm not giving him credit or not giving him credit — I'm just saying that's a very hard thing to do."
Trump has praised the North Korean dictator's unmerciful rule in the past. During a campaign stop in Iowa in 2016, he was reported to have said, "You gotta give him credit."
"How many young guys — he was, like, 26 or 25 when his father died — take over these tough generals, and all of a sudden ... he goes in, he takes over, and he's the boss," said Trump, according to ABC News. "It's incredible. He wiped out the uncle, he wiped out this one, that one. I mean, this guy doesn't play games."
As the youngest son of Kim Jong Il — the previous leader who died from a heart attack in 2011 — Jong Un seceded his father's place after being heralded as "a great person born of heaven," according to North Korea's state-run media.
Trump's latest comments come at a time when the US and North Korea delivered a salvo of verbal threats, and amid the controversial deployment of a naval strike group in the Korean peninsula.
"There is a chance that we could end up having a major, major conflict with North Korea. Absolutely," Trump said to Reuters. "We'd love to solve things diplomatically but it's very difficult."
You can listen to Trump's entire Reuters interview below:
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