“North Korea fired off some small weapons, which disturbed some of my people, and others, but not me. I have confidence that Chairman Kim will keep his promise to me,” he said on Twitter.

Trump is currently in Japan on a state visit.

The president, who left his second summit with Kim earlier this year in Vietnam without a peace deal, has put enormous value in their personal relationship, despite actions by North Korea that others consider provocative.

Trump is expected to discuss concerns about North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during his stay in Tokyo.

In his tweet, the president, who is running for re-election in 2020, knocked his potential Democratic opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, misspelling his name and taking pleasure in the North Korean leader’s sharp rhetoric about a fellow American.

Trump said in the tweet that he smiled when Kim “called Swampman Joe Bidan a low IQ individual, & worse. Perhaps that’s sending me a signal?”

Trump regularly uses derisive nicknames to target his political opponents.

Trump’s remarks came after U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton said on Saturday that North Korea’s recent missile launches violated a U.N. Security Council resolution.

Earlier this month Kim oversaw the first flight of a previously untested weapon – a relatively small, fast missile experts believe will be easier to hide, launch and maneuver in flight.

The United States on Friday announced the deployment of 1,500 troops to the Middle East, describing it as an effort to bolster defenses against Iran as it accused the country’s Revolutionary Guards of direct responsibility for this month’s tanker attacks.

“America.. is sending two warships to the region. If they commit the slightest stupidity, we will send these ships to the bottom of the sea along with their crew and planes using two missiles or two new secret weapons,” General Morteza Qorbani, an adviser to Iran’s military command, told Mizan.

The U.S. actions were the latest by the Trump administration as it highlights what it sees as a threat of potential attack by Iran, and follows decisions to speed the deployment of an aircraft carrier strike group as well as send bombers and additional Patriot missiles to the Middle East.

Western experts say Iran often exaggerates its weapons capabilities, although there are concerns about its missile program and particularly its long-range ballistic missiles.

Hancock follows former foreign minister Boris Johnson, who is seen as the favourite, current foreign minister Jeremy Hunt, International Development Secretary Rory Stewart and former work and pensions minister Esther McVey in joining the contest.

“I’m going to run to be the next prime minister because I believe from the bottom of my heart we need a leader for the future not just for now,” Hancock told BBC radio.

“Of course we have to deliver Brexit and I will.”

May said on Friday she would step down as Conservative Party leader on June 7 after admitting defeat in her bid to get parliament to pass a divorce deal she agreed with the European Union (EU).

The opposition Labour Party said it wanted an election as soon as possible. Labour’s finance spokesman John McDonnell confirmed on Saturday the party would bring a vote of no confidence in the government if it looked like it might pass.

May, who took over in the aftermath of the 2016 Brexit referendum, was forced to make way following a Conservative mutiny over her ill-fated strategy to end Britain’s near five-decade membership of the European Union.

“It is and will always remain a matter of deep regret to me that I have not been able to deliver Brexit,” May said outside her Downing Street office, holding back tears.

“It will be for my successor to seek a way forward that honours the result of the referendum.”

May, 62, who will be among the country’s shortest-serving post-WWII prime ministers remembered for presiding over one of the most chaotic periods in its modern political history, said she would step down as head of the Conservative Party on June 7.

She will remain in Downing Street in a caretaker role until a replacement is elected by the party before July 20.

Any new leader of the party, which won the most votes in the last election, automatically becomes prime minister.

‘Dangerous phase’

Gaffe-prone Brexit cheerleader Boris Johnson, who resigned as foreign secretary last summer over May’s withdrawal strategy, is the immediate front-runner to succeed her.

He said Friday that under his leadership Britain would leave the EU with or without a deal on October 31 — the latest deadline agreed with Brussels after Brexit was twice delayed.

“The way to get a good deal is to prepare for a no-deal situation,” he told an economic conference in Switzerland, according to Bloomberg. “To get things done you need to be prepared to walk away.”

The pound wobbled as analysts said her imminent departure amplified the chances of leaving the EU without a deal.

However, EU leaders struck a defiantly contrasting tone.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said the withdrawal plan agreed was “not up for renegotiation”.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she “respects” May’s decision and would keep working towards an “orderly” Brexit, while Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar warned the saga was entering “a phase that may be a very dangerous one for Ireland”.

May received more sympathy from Brexit-backing US President Donald Trump, who said “I feel badly for Theresa. I like her very much. She is a good woman.”

‘Misjudged the mood’

May was pushed into the humiliating spectacle of a hastily arranged resignation announcement following a meeting with the Conservative Party’s committee chief in charge of leadership elections.

She had been under rising pressure following months of Brexit-fuelled political paralysis, which intensified following disastrous results in the May 2 English local elections.

The Conservatives are expected to fare even worse in this week’s European Parliament elections when results are announced Sunday.

“Politically she misjudged the mood of the country and her party,” said Nigel Farage, whose new Brexit Party is predicted to emphatically win the contest in Britain.

The beleaguered leader had previously vowed to step aside once her unpopular EU divorce deal had passed parliament, and this week launched a short-lived bid for lawmakers to approve it in early June.

MPs have overwhelmingly rejected the agreement three times, weakening May on each occasion

Her latest effort to force it through the House of Commons, which included giving MPs the option of holding a referendum on it, proved her final undoing, prompted a furious reaction from Conservatives, including cabinet members.

‘No legacy’

May will leave office without any significant achievements — other than her bungled handling of Brexit, say analysts. Photo by AFP/Daniel Leal-Olivas

Her departure kickstarts a Conservative Party leadership contest — already unofficially under way — that is expected to encompass more than a dozen candidates and favour an ardent Brexiteer.

Tory MPs will hold a series of votes to whittle the contenders down to a final two that will be put to the party’s more than 100,000 members.

Johnson is the membership’s favourite, but numerous Conservative lawmakers are thought to hold serious reservations about his suitability for the top job.

May was the surprise victor in the 2016 leadership contest to replace then prime minister David Cameron after he quit following the EU referendum.

Despite having campaigned to Remain, she embraced the cause with the mantra “Brexit means Brexit”.

However the decision to hold a disastrous snap election in June 2017, when she lost her parliamentary majority, left her stymied.

Her dismally dysfunctional government saw 36 ministerial resignations — a modern record.

May will leave office without any significant achievements — other than her bungled handling of Brexit, according to political analysts.

“She doesn’t really have a legacy,” said Simon Usherwood, of the University of Surrey.

“I think anybody in her position would have had great difficulty.”

Others were more brutal in their assessment.

“It was only an impossible job because she made it one,” said Tim Bale of Queen Mary University of London.

The involvement of India and Japan is the latest sign that Sri Lanka wants to neutralise the growing influence of China, which has poured money into the South Asian island under its mammoth Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) infrastructure plan, to the alarm of other Asian powers.

A source close to the Indian High Commission in Sri Lanka said a framework for the terminal project will be “signed soon”, while another source said the project would cost about $500 million and India and Japan will nominate companies that will handle the containers from their respective countries.

“The deal is being negotiated among Sri Lanka, India and Japan,” Sudarshana Gunawardana, an official in Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s office told Reuters. The Sri Lankan government will have a 51 percent stake in the terminal, he said.

Chinese firms have a mandate to operate Colombo International Container Terminals (CICT) and develop another terminal on a 269-hectare plot of reclaimed land there.

This is not the first time that Sri Lanka has held talks with India and Japan to develop a container terminal.

A previous proposal for a terminal, with the state-run Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) owning a 15% stake and the remainder held by a consortium of firms from Japan, India and Sri Lanka was scuttled last year after a backlash from trade unions.

Trade unions protested against the privatisation of state assets including those being developed by Chinese firms, a dispute that led to President Maithripala Sirisena sacking Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in October. Wickremesinghe was reinstated later after a court ruling.

A spokesman at SLPA said the company was unaware of the latest talks given they are being conducted between the governments.

“All the flash points are defused in the new deal compared to the earlier one,” one Sri Lankan government source privy to the discussions said.

The three countries will set up a company to operate the terminal after the Sri Lankan cabinet approves the deal. Japan will provide a 40-year soft loan with a 0.1 percent interest rate with a 10-year grace period, this source said.

A diplomat at the Japanese embassy in Colombo also confirmed negotiations on the port terminal were taking place.

“Japanese funding will be decided later once the framework is finalised,” the diplomat said.

The sources and diplomats declined to be identified as they are not authorised to speak to the media.

India has been trying to counterbalance China’s growing influence in Sri Lanka, which New Delhi has long considered its own backyard. India accounts for around 70 percent of the transshipment business in Colombo port.

China has also taken over a new $1.5 billion port city in Hambantota, in southeast Sri Lanka – which sits on a key east-west global shipping route – after Sri Lanka was unable to service debt payments.

However, Sri Lanka has also signed an agreement with a subsidiary of an Indian firm for a $3.85 billion oil refinery near the Chinese controlled port in Hambantota, and India is in advanced talks with Sri Lankan authorities for a joint venture to operate a Chinese-built airport in Hambantota.

More than 200 climbers were taking advantage of clear weather on Wednesday to attempt to summit from both Nepal and China, but teams had to line up for hours to reach the top — risking frostbite and altitude sickness.

An American and Indian climber are the latest fatalities, their expedition organisers said, on one of the busiest-ever days on the the 8,848-meter (29,029-foot) peak.

Donald Lynn Cash, 55, collapsed at the summit on Wednesday as he was taking photographs, while Anjali Kulkarni, also 55, died while descending after reaching the top.

Kulkarni’s expedition organiser, Arun Treks, said heavy traffic at the summit had delayed her descent and caused her death.

“She had to wait for a long time to reach the summit and descend,” said Thupden Sherpa. “She couldn’t move down on her own and died as Sherpa guides brought her down.”

Pasang Tenje Sherpa, of Pioneer Adventure, told AFP that Cash collapsed on the summit and died close to Hillary Step as guides were bringing him back.

The deaths take the toll on Everest to four this season, after an Indian climber died last week and an Irish mountaineer is presumed dead after he slipped and fell close to the summit.

Mountaineering in Nepal has become a lucrative business since Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first ascent of Everest in 1953.

The Himalayan nation has issued a record 381 permits costing $11,000 each for this year’s spring climbing season, sparking fears of bottlenecks en route to the summit if poor weather cuts down the number of climbing days.

Most Everest hopefuls are escorted by a Nepali guide, meaning more than 750 climbers will tread the same path to the top in the coming weeks.

At least 140 others have been granted permits to scale Everest from the northern flank in Tibet, according to expedition operators. This could take the total past last year’s record of 807 people reaching the summit.

Many Himalayan mountains — including Everest — are at peak climbing season, with the window of good weather between late April and the end of May.

At least six other foreign climbers have died on other 8,000-meter Himalayan peaks this season, while two are missing.