DUBLIN -- The United States is the main player in efforts to end North Korea’s nuclear program because denuclearization is linked closely to guaranteeing the security of the regime in Pyongyang, South Korea’s prime minister said Tuesday.

The remark, made to reporters at the end of his weeklong trip to Europe, is in line with Lee’s earlier revelation that the US has asked South Korea not to get involved too deeply in the issue of denuclearizing the communist nation.

“When it comes to the denuclearization issue, the US cannot help but be the main player because it is linked to guaranteeing the (North’s) system,” Lee said in Dublin. “South Korea has also played certain roles, and I believe it cannot help but continue to do so.”

The joint declaration issued in June last year after the first summit between President Moon Jae-in and US President Donald Trump says the US supports South Korea playing the leading role in inter-Korean reconciliation and peace, not in the denuclearization issue, Lee said.

South Korea has played a mediating role between the US and the North, seeking to make sure that the first-ever summit between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will take place in Singapore on June 12 as scheduled.

Asked if there is any possibility of Moon traveling to Singapore, Lee said he sees no such sign.

“It depends on how far the US and the North have gone in terms of setting the agenda, but there’s no sign yet that President Moon would go,” he said.

Lee also said he is proud that Moon’s role is being recognized by the North and the US, pointing out that the North’s leader asked first to hold a surprise meeting with Moon last Saturday, and that the US is also working to move talks with the North forward. (Yonhap)