The White House said Friday that President Donald Trump will not meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un unless Pyongyang takes "concrete and verifiable actions," stoking confusion as the administration faced criticism for agreeing to talks while receiving few, if any, tangible benefits in return.

"We're not going to have this meeting take place until we see concrete actions that match the words and the rhetoric of North Korea," White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told a televised news conference.

She said the North Koreans had "promised to denuclearize, they have promised to stop nuclear and missile testing, and they've recognized that we're going to continue in our military exercises." But Sanders did not clarify what precise steps the Kim regime would need to take for the talks to go ahead.