Some 50 South Korean business leaders are likely to accompany President Park Geun-hye on her first trip to Washington as president next month in what could be the largest business delegation meant to ease possible jitters among American investors amid tensions with North Korea, officials said Tuesday.
The delegation will likely include Lee Kun-hee, the chairman of Samsung Electronics Co., the world’s top maker of smartphones, memory chips and flat-panel TVs, as well as other heads of conglomerates, known as chaebol, said officials of the Federation of Korean Industries, South Korea’s most powerful business lobby that speaks for the country’s large businesses.
Lee is believed to be planning to visit the U.S. separately and join the business delegation.
It would be the first time for Lee to join an overseas trip by a South Korean president since 2004 when he traveled to Russia and Kazakhstan with then President Roh Moo-hyun.
Park is set to hold summit talks with U.S. President Barack Obama on May 7, the first overseas trip since she took office in February.
A South Korean government official described the largest business delegation as a chance for South Korea to assure American businessmen of their investments in Asia’s fourth-largest economy despite a torrent of North Korea’s military threats. The official asked not to be identified, citing policy.
The trip will also offer a chance for Park and South Korea’s business leaders to hold their first face-to-face meeting since she took office with a pledge to bring about economic democratization in a country that has been dominated by family-controlled chaebol.
In December, Park met with big business leaders and urged them to share their firms’ growth with the larger community and to protect the business rights of mom and pop stores by staying away from some local commercial areas.
The delegation is also expected to include heads of some small and medium-sized companies, and some female business leaders, though its exact makeup was not immediately available.
Park has vowed to stop chaebol from abusing their power, and to protect mom and pop stores and smaller firms by strengthening regulations meant to ensure fair business practices. (Yonhap News)
