Turkey hopes for nuclear partnership with Korea

By Kwaak Je-yup

Turkey is committed to a strong, long-lasting economic partnership with Korea, welcoming nuclear power cooperation in future sites, Turkish Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan said Friday.

"Turkey is open to the bids of the Korean companies,” said Caglayan at a roundtable interview, adding that negotiations have yet led to a definitive deal for the country’s second nuclear plant project in Sinop, a city on the Black Sea in northern Turkey.

“I’d like to (tell) Korean companies they can continue working. Third, fourth (plants) will be built in Turkey, also.” The first site in Mersin, a port on the Mediterranean, had been signed with Russia.

Last year, what was believed to be a certain agreement between Korea and Turkey fell apart, with Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO), of Japan, snapping up the project. After the company’s tsunami-struck Fukushima atomic station devastated the entire region, it cancelled the deal, leaving the race re-opened to such countries as Korea and France.

Caglayan, flanked by his staff and leading businessmen of his country, flew into Seoul Monday and is scheduled to return home today. He has met with government ministers as well as conglomerate tycoons to forge ahead with bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) and to encourage foreign direct investment (FDI) into Turkey.

He said that the trade talks made significant progress this time around, with “all bottlenecks eliminated.” At least the goods section of the FTA will be signed by the end of this year and the remaining services and investment also finalized shortly after, next year.

Currently, both countries manage export-driven economies, with important industries like automobile, construction and shipbuilding overlapping. This, Caglayan said, made the two nations perfect partners.

“Turkey and Korea are not competing against each other but complementary,” he said.

He likened the prospective partnership to “buttons on two collars of a shirt,” implying one is indispensable to the other. He said Turkey can be Korea’s gateway to Africa, the Middle East and Europe in the same way the peninsula can be Turkey’s launch pad for East Asia.

Despite international concerns about his country’s unchecked political power and growing diplomatic ambitions, Caglayan claimed that the nation’s “political and economic stability” are the reasons why Korean companies can benefit from a strong bilateral partnership.

Turkey attracted international attention recently for its mushrooming trade deficit, which reached a new high of $10.2 billion in June. Korea currently exports 16 times more to Turkey than vice versa.