President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will hold a summit in PyeongChang, the alpine town that will host the upcoming Winter Olympics, the Foreign Ministry said Friday.
Abe will fly to South Korea through Yangyang Airport near PyeongChang to celebrate the Olympics, a ministry official said in a background briefing.
Moon will hold talks with 14 top state and government representatives before and during the Feb. 9-25 Winter Olympics and March 9-18 Paralympics, the ministry official said.
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South Korean President Moon Jae-in (R) shakes hands with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe before the start of their bilateral summit on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia, on Sept. 7, 2017. (Yonhap) |
Moon will host talks with US Vice President Mike Pence in Seoul.
Han Zheng, a member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China who will visit the South as President Xi Jinping’s special envoy, will also meet with Moon in the South Korean capital, according to the ministry official.
In celebration of the Olympics, a total of 26 top-level officials from 21 foreign countries will visit South Korea during the international sporting events, the biggest gathering of foreign leaders in the country since the hosting of the Nuclear Security Summit in 2012, the official noted.
They include German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Slovenian President Borut Pahor and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
Chinese President Xi could possibly join the guest list, but a final decision has not been made.
“It is still undecided. But at some point in the future, there may be an announcement (of a decision),” the official said.
The Foreign Ministry is currently operating a 150-member protocol task force for the visiting leaders.
The ministry will provide an all-terrain full-size sedan to each visiting state head and top-level official. It will also operate unscheduled bullet trains to carry the high-ranking guests to PyeongChang, the official said. (Yonhap)
