Watch Kim Jong Un’s aide panic on the red carpet
SUMMARY
Kim Jong Un's arrival in Vietnam for a second summit with President Donald Trump took an unusual turn when an aide appeared to miss his cue during a grand entrance.
Video footage of Kim's arrival in Dong Dong, on the China-Vietnam border, shows the North Korean leader walking down a red carpet ramp from his personal armored train.
He initially descends alone. A few seconds later, an aide appears to realise what is going on, and quickly runs down the ramp to join Kim.
You can the moment in this video, via the Filipino ABS-CBN news channel. The aide's sprint down the carpet comes around the 14-second mark:
The entourage had just completed a marathon 2,000-mile train ride from Pyongyang, across a vast expanse of southern China, which lasted two and a half days.
Experts say that Kim's decision to travel by train could have been to avoid the appearance of being reliant on China, after he received significant attention for borrowing plane from the government-owned Air China to get to his last summit with Trump in Singapore.
The optics of Kim travelling by train could also remind North Koreans of Kim's grandfather, who used the same train to get to countries like Vietnam as well as the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, The Associated Press reported.
Trump has characterized the summit as a follow-up to the leaders' first summit in Singapore in June 2018, when North Korea made a vague commitment to working toward denuclearization.
Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump shaking hands at the red carpet during the Singapore Summit in June 2018.
Pyongyang appears to have made little progress on that front since the first meeting. US intelligence and North Korea experts have warned that North Korea is unlikely to give up its nuclear arms.
Trump told the Governors' Ball on Feb. 24, 2019, that he was "not pushing for speed" with North Korea's denuclearization.
However, he tweeted on Feb. 25, 2019: "With complete Denuclearization, North Korea will rapidly become an Economic Powerhouse. Without it, just more of the same. Chairman Kim will make a wise decision!"
Trump tweeted on Feb. 25, 2019, that he was "Looking forward to a very productive Summit!"
This article originally appeared on Business Insider. Follow @BusinessInsider on Twitter.
