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| President Moon Jae-in shakes hands with Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan in the latter's office before a summit with the United Arab Emirates leader, Sunday. / Yonhap |
By Kim Rahn
ABU DHABI ― President Moon Jae-in and Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan agreed, Sunday, that defense cooperation is the core of relations between Korea and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The two leaders decided to develop the bilateral relationship from a strategic partnership into a "special strategic partnership."
The agreements were made in a summit during Moon's visit to the UAE. This is his first UAE visit since taking office in May.
Moon indirectly mentioned a controversy over secret military deals with the UAE reached during former President Lee Myung-bak's term in 2009, and the following dispute between the nations over it.
"There was a hitch, but the relations between Korea and the UAE have not been damaged at all," Moon was quoted as saying by presidential spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom. "Rather, this became a chance for Korea to gain public sympathy over the two nations' cooperation in the defense sector and to strengthen it."
But he and Cheong Wa Dae officials did not elaborate further on this.
Since December when presidential chief of staff Im Jong-seok visited the UAE and met with the crown prince as Moon's special envoy, suspicions have lingered that he went there to mitigate a dispute over military deals. Afterward, a former defense minister who served under Lee admitted Korea signed a secret deal to send troops automatically to the UAE if the latter became engaged in a military conflict. Moon said earlier this year he would seek to revise or supplement the deals if they had flaws.
The leaders agreed that Im, who accompanied the President to the UAE, and Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak, chairman of the Executive Affairs Authority of Abu Dhabi who came to Korea in January as the crown prince's special envoy, would be the channel of communication when difficulties take place in developing bilateral relations.
Korea and the UAE will form a vice minister-level consultative group in diplomacy and defense, and this body is expected to help resolve the military deal issue.
While the UAE is the Middle East's largest importer of Korea-made weapons, the leaders agreed to seek a win-win way of developing defense technologies.
"Moon said he would cooperate in not only transferring defense technology to the UAE but also developing and manufacturing weapons together and jointly advancing into third countries," Kim said.
Korea and the UAE established their strategic partnership in 2009, when Korea won a project to construct the UAE's first nuclear power plant in Barakah. They now decided to upgrade it to a special strategic partnership.
"The two nations have had cooperation in many sectors, but I expect more comprehensive development," the crown prince was quoted as saying. "We hope the bilateral relations will develop as much as Moon wants and even beyond that."
Besides the consultative body, the two leaders also agreed on holding strategy talks between the foreign ministers of the two nations more often, and economy-related committee talks annually.
Noting that Korea and the UAE have cooperated in energy, infrastructure, defense and healthcare, they agreed to expand the partnership into high value-added technologies for the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and into wider fields including science and technology, space development, intellectual property and agricultural industry.
Alongside the summit, ministers of the two nations signed five memoranda of understanding (MOUs) for cooperation in science, information and communications technology, businesses of mid-sized companies, renewable energy, patent-related administration and agreement for Korea's participation in 2020 Dubai Expo.
They had a lunch, which was also attended by GS EPS President Huh Yong-soo, Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman Yoon Boo-keun, Hanwha Vice Chairman Keum Chun-soo, SK Innovation CEO Kim Jun, Poongsan Chairman Ryu Jin, Hyundai Engineering & Construction CEO Park Dong-wook, LG Chem Vice Chairman Park Jin-soo, LS Cable & System President Myung Roe-hyun and CJ Logistics CEO Park Geun-tae.
Later in the day, Moon also met other high-level officials of the country, including Al Mubarak, and Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, minister of state and CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company.
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