IVANKA Trump has told South Korea’s president that she will use her visit to the Winter Olympics to call for maximum pressure on North Korea to halt its nuclear programme.

The daughter of US president Donald Trump is leading a delegation at this weekend’s closing ceremony for the Pyeongchang Games.

South Korean leader Moon Jae-in, however, highlighted at a banquet at the presidential compound how the Olympics have helped start a dialogue between the two Koreas. The banquet was delayed by about half an hour as Moon and Ms Trump met in private.

Ms Trump said she was in South Korea to celebrate the Olympics and to reaffirm the US commitment to a “maximum pressure campaign to ensure that the Korean Peninsula is denuclearised”.

A high-level North Korean delegation will also attend the closing ceremony, but the South Korean government said it is unlikely that Ms Trump will meet the North Koreans.

Moon has tried to use the Olympics as an avenue for peace on the divided Korean Peninsula.