South Korea embraces Central Asian leaders, looking to boost regional clout
Seoul is set to host its first presidential meeting with five Russia-allied states positioning themselves as a bloc.
South Korea is set to welcome the heads of the five Central Asian states for the first-ever presidential summit between Seoul and the region, a meeting local media have dubbed “historic”.
Wednesday’s summit, preceded by bilateral meetings between South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and leaders of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, aims to deepen economic engagement between Central Asia and the host, and put them on a more permanent footing.
“The first expectation is political. The summit will raise a dialogue that has existed since 2007 to the level of heads of state. But the real test is whether it produces a workable agenda in critical minerals, energy, digital technologies and transport,” Sanat Kushkumbayev, from the Kazakhstan Institute for Strategic Studies, told Al Jazeera.
“When my grandparents arrived in southern Kazakhstan, it was autumn, and it was already cold, but they had no houses to live in. That winter they lived with local Kazakh people who supported them and deportees from other countries,” said Roman Zakharov, a half-Korean artist from Kazakhstan.