Photo: The Canadian Press

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said Kim Jong Un wants a historic, high-stakes meeting as soon as possible and suggested the North Korean dictator has been "very open" and "very honourable," a sharply different assessment of a leader he once denounced as "Little Rocket Man."

The United States and North Korea have been negotiating a summit between Trump and Kim to be held in May or June to broker a deal on Pyongyang's nuclear program. Trump, who has struck a decidedly optimistic tone on the situation in recent days, said Tuesday that the United States and North Korea were having "good discussions."

"We have been told directly that they would like to have the meeting as soon as possible. We think that's a great thing for the world," Trump said at the White House alongside French President Emmanuel Macron. "Kim Jong Un, he really has been very open and I think very honourable from everything we're seeing."

Trump cautioned that North Korea had not followed through on previous promises, but credited tough steps from his administration — including sanctions and organizing pressure from international allies — for having forced Pyongyang to hold talks. And he again suggested that he would "leave the table" if the negotiations were not productive or if North Korea was not operating in good faith.

"We'll see where that all goes," the president said. "Maybe it will be wonderful or maybe it won't."

Trump's comments came days after a flurry of moves from North Korea that the White House was anxious to promote as signs that its coercion campaign was working. On Saturday, North Korea announced it will close its nuclear testing facility and suspend nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile tests — a move welcomed by Trump as "big progress."

However, the North stopped short of suggesting it will give up its nuclear weapons — as Trump suggested in a weekend tweet — or scale back its production of missiles and their related components. When pressed Tuesday on what he meant by the goal of "denuclearization," Trump said, "It means they get rid of their nukes. Very simple."

"It would be easy for me to make a simple deal and declare victory. I don't want to do that," the president said.