That was one shade softer than the previous USA position, which demanded that North Korea dismantle its nuclear program entirely before talks could begin.
Pence (C) delivers a speech on board the USS Ronald Reagan on April 19, 2017.
Will the US shoot down one of the North Korean missile tests from the South China Sea and put its allies, South Korea and Japan at the risk of a response from Kim Jong-un?
Among the war-game scenarios at the Pentagon's disposal are an airstrike using precision-guided munitions, launched from submarines or stealth aircraft, against the Yongbyon nuclear reactor facility, where North Korea has produced plutonium for its bombs.
US Vice President Mike Pence, on a tour of Asian allies, has said repeatedly the "era of strategic patience" with North Korea is over.
Later Mr Pence vowed to "defeat any attack and meet any use of conventional or nuclear weapons with an overwhelming and effective American response".
SEOUL - The U.S. Air Force dispatched a nuclear sniffer aircraft Thursday to the east of the Korean Peninsula amid the possibility of North Korea's imminent nuclear test, a government source said.
"The problem with thinking about preemptive attacks against North Korea is that you're rapidly forced to think about attacking more and more targets", Wit said during Tuesday's teleconference call.
"If those businessmen in power in the USA thought of intimidating us by any military or sanction threats - as the [Barack] Obama administration used to do and failed - they will soon find out such threats are useless".
Hopefully this White House reduces tensions and implements a long-term strategy that denuclearizes the Korean peninsula - the stated goal of both the United States and China.
Washington has a treaty alliance with Seoul and has more than 28 000 troops in the South to defend it from its neighbour. The Trump administration, like those before it, appears to have no clear objective for North Korea, Gardiner says, whether it's regime change, preventing Pyongyang from getting a nuclear weapon or something else.
Tillerson: Iran nuclear agreement fails to achieve objectives
She said the review was a fig leaf to cover a decision by the Trump administration to abide by the Iran accord, if grudgingly. But after he took office, the U.S. president has not yet explicitly said he would pull out from the historic agreement.
"We said it was heading there".
"Bad welding, bad parts, bad engineering and bad luck can all play a role in such failures - as it did in the United States' own missile program, particularly in its early days", the Times notes.
Mr Trump has been pressuring China, North Korea's benefactor, to help defuse the situation, but has also warned that the United States will settle the issue alone if other countries will not help.
Days later, in response to a question about the warships, Trump told the Fox Business Network that the United States was "sending an armada, very powerful" to North Korea.
But at the time of the announcements, the ships had temporarily headed in the opposite direction, to the Indian Ocean, for military exercises with Australia.
That window is the closeness in time between a South Korean election and a provocative act by North Korea, meaning a nuclear or missile test.
The Trump administration has signaled a forceful US stance on North Korea's recent actions, dispatching Pence to the Demilitarized Zone dividing North and South Korea on Monday in a show of American resolve.
China and the South China Sea are also likely topics when Japan's Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida joins the other ministers. We've said it as clearly as we can possibly say it.
He also said more of America's most advanced military assets would be deployed to the Asia-Pacific.
In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters he hopes "there will be no unilateral actions like those we saw recently in Syria and that the USA will follow the line that President Trump repeatedly voiced during the election campaign".
Since then Korean leaders from across the political spectrum have criticized Trump's inartful characterization of Korean history, calling it an attempt at undermining Korean sovereignty, the Washington Post reports.
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