Tuesday morning’s Yomiuri and Sankei front-paged reports on Vice President Pence’s interview with Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin aboard Air Force Two on his way home from South Korea. Yomiuri and Sankei wrote that while saying that the maximum pressure campaign will continue and intensify until North Korea takes a meaningful step toward denuclearization, the Vice President hinted at the possibility of direct dialogue with the DPRK by reportedly saying: “If you want to talk, we’ll talk.”

Rogin wrote in the Post that the Vice President told him that “in his two substantive conversations with South Korean President Moon Jae-in during his trip, the United States and South Korea agreed on terms for further engagement with North Korea – first by the South Koreans and potentially with the United States soon thereafter.” According to Rogin, “Pence called it ‘maximum pressure and engagement at the same time.’”

In a related development, Tuesday’s Asahi wrote that it has learned from several intelligence sources in Seoul that although the South Korean government tried to arrange a meeting between Vice President Pence and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister Kim Yo Jong in Seoul on Saturday, both sides reportedly rejected the idea.