'I don't believe he knew about it.' Trump defends Kim Jong Un on Otto Warmbier's death
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said Thursday he did not hold Kim Jong Un responsible for the death of Otto Warmbier, the U.S. college student who died after being imprisoned in North Korea.
In 2016, Warmbier, then 21 years old, was arrested and accused of committing a "hostile act" as he tried to leave North Korea. He was sent home to his parents in Ohio in June 2017 in a coma with a massive brain injury and died afterward.
Trump, who abruptly ended a Vietnam summit with Kim on nuclear disarmament, was asked by a reporter about the discussions he had with the North Korean leader on Warmbier's death.
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"I don't believe he knew about it," Trump said of Kim. "He tells me that he didn't know about it and I will take him at his word."
After two days of meetings in Hanoi, Trump and Kim could not agree on terms for denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. During the summit, Trump largely avoided discussing the human rights record of North Korea, a reclusive authoritarian country.
"I think they're an incredible family," Trump said of the Warmbiers. "What happened is horrible."
Warmbier, a University of Virginia student, had been due to stay in North Korea for a five-day study tour when he was accused by North Korea of tearing down a propaganda post in his room.
He was sentenced to 15 years hard labor. When he was returned home to his parents in Cincinnati, he had a massive brain injury that left him blind, deaf and unable to move on his own. He died a few days later.
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A federal judge in December ordered North Korea to pay Fred and Cindy Warmbier more than $501 million for mistreating him and causing his death. The Warmbiers filed the lawsuit last April but the North Korean government never responded.
In 2017, Trump raised Otto Warmbier’s story as he promised “to handle” North Korea. The president described Warmbier's parents as "powerful witnesses" to North Korea's horrors during his 2018 State of the Union as the family watched from a guest box in the House chamber.
The Warmbiers had hoped there might be a secret government mission to rescue Otto. But Warmbier's parents have also praised Trump, saying last year that they appreciated his comments about their family and hoped "something positive" could come out of the historic first summit between the president and Kim that took place in Singapore.
The Warmbier family did not respond to a request for comment.
Trump's remarks on Warmbier harkened to widely criticized comments he made during a press conference last year with Vladimir Putin, in which the president said he took the Russian president at his word that Moscow did not try to influence the 2016 presidential election. U.S. intelligence agencies had already said Putin was involved in that effort.
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Contributing: Anne Saker and Sam Rosenstiel of the Cincinnati Enquirer, Kim Hjelmgaard and Deirdre Shesgreen
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'I don't believe he knew about it.' Trump defends Kim Jong Un on Otto Warmbier's death
