U.S. President Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un have met twice, in Hanoi in February and Singapore last June, seeming to build personal goodwill but failing to agree on a deal to lift U.S. sanctions in exchange for North Korea abandoning its nuclear and missile programs.
Shouldn’t it be “met” as the meetings had already taken place?
Thanks!
It’s two sentences merged into one:
They met twice (so far). – present perfect.
They met in Hanoi in February and in Singapore last June. – simple past
Sorry, Torsten.
Does it mean that the original is correct?
As far as I’m concerned the sentence is grammatically correct. Whether it’s well-written and easy to read is another question.
@Kohyoongliat.
Yes, I’d agree with you.
The verbal ‘have met’ is in the present perfect while the time adverb is ‘last june’, which is a definite time in the past.
The practice demands that we use the Past Simple if the time mentioned refers to the specific past (here ‘last June’).
(Alternatively, you may replace ‘last June’ by ‘recently’ or ‘in the past’ etc though it may interfere with the author’s intention of being specific).