Trump to meet South Korea's Moon with North Korea summit hanging in the balance

US President Donald Trump met South Korean President Moon Jae-in on Tuesday amid concerns that Trump's planned summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on denuclearization next month might fall apart.

Moon's White House visit was intended to be a fine-tuning of the US and South Korean strategy for dealing with Kim at what would be the first-ever meeting between US and North Korean presidents.

But the White House was caught off-guard when, in a dramatic change of tone, North Korea last week condemned the latest US-South Korean air combat drills, suspended North-South talks and threw into doubt the summit with Trump if Pyongyang was pushed toward "unilateral nuclear abandonment."

Moon and Trump began their meeting shortly after noon EDT (1600 GMT). They also were to have a working lunch.

Before seeing Trump, Moon met with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and national security adviser John Bolton and urged them to speed preparations for the Trump-Kim summit.