Uncle Tom Cobley and all want to see Kim Jong-un

Talk about everyone wanting to get in on the act. As soon as Donald Trump announced he was happy to meet the North Korean leader for a summit to talk about denuclearising the Korean Peninsula, government heads have put their bids in to see Kim Jong-un. What fun he must be having. Suddenly he is at the very centre of a diplomatic whirlwind. Now President Bashar Assad of Syria has aparently indicated he would like to visit Chairman Kim in Pyongyang. What on earth for? Well, the two countries do have diplomatic relations, so I guess it's legitimate, but Assad has never shown any interest in seeing Kim before now, so he must be up to his personal kind of mischief. Perhaps he has a bit of nuclear technology exchange chatting in mind. Either that, or he just wants the world to focus on him doing something other than killing his own citizens. So, apart from Moon Jae-in, South Korean president, who met him at Panmunjom, Xi Zinping who met Kim in Beijing, and Mike Pompeo who saw him in Pyongyang, and Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister who probably brought a message from Putin for Kim when he spoke to his opposite number in the North Korean capital, we have to add Assad whose pennyworth of advice, I suspect, will be worth zilch in the great scheme of things. Who else will try to muscle in? Perhaps that great master of intrigue, Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, will put in a call. And Bibi Netanyahu is never slow in coming forward to grab some limelight, although a call or visit from the Israeli leader would look distinctly out of place. No one from Europe is going to do anything in case they make Trump even angrier with his European allies than he is already. So, forget it, Jean-Claude Juncker, no job for you. Tony Blair must be tempted. But in which of his many roles would it look appropriate? None. The best for peace in the peninsula would be for everyone to step back and let Trump have a go. If it works out, then most of the rest of the world will benefit. I say most, because Kim's Chinese neighbours are looking for one result and one result only - the withdrawal of all American troops from the region, South Korea and Japan. But that is not going to happen, at least I hope not.