RIYADH, 22 March 2007 — South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun is to visit the Kingdom on Saturday and meet with Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah and senior Saudi officials, according to the Korean Embassy in Riyadh.
The president will be accompanied by several ministers. Some 200 Korean businessmen, who are accompanying the president, are also scheduled to hold talks with their Saudi counterparts in the capital on Sunday.
The talks are the first between the heads of states of the two countries since 1980 when the-then president of South Korea met with the late King Khaled.
“The two leaders are expected to exchange views on the situation in the region, especially in Lebanon, Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” said Jaegil Lee, South Korean ambassador to the Kingdom.
Another issue the Korean president is expected to discuss with King Abdullah is the situation in the Korean Peninsula as well as the North Korean nuclear standoff. The situation in Darfur and the outcome of the Makkah agreement are also expected to be discussed.
Lee said his government supported UN resolutions regarding the Iran nuclear issue and believed the best way to solve the crisis was through dialogue. “Korea’s main interests in the Middle East region are economic,” he said. “More than 80 percent of our crude oil is coming from this region. The instability of this region has a great importance in our energy sector as well as trade and investment.”
The ambassador lauded steps taken by the Saudi government to combat terrorism. On the economic issues, the Korean president will speak to Saudi leaders about ways to improve economic bilateral trade. The Saudi-Korean Business Council is expected to be held in the capital on the second day of the visit.
A Memorandum of Understanding to avoid double taxation as well as another MOU in higher education is expected to be signed during the president’s visit.
The Saudi minister of higher education had earlier signed an agreement with the South Korean government in which Saudi students would be sent on government-paid scholarships to the country. There are 84 Saudi students currently in South Korean institutions majoring in computer science and engineering.
The ambassador hopes more Saudi students will be sent to South Korea, adding that the Korean culture was similar to the Saudi culture in many ways in terms of both being eastern cultures.
The trade flow between Saudi Arabia and Korea is $23.5 billion as of last year. The total value of Korean exports to the Kingdom was $3.5 billion, mainly in the automobile industry and electronics.
The trade volume is in favor of the Kingdom, whose main exports to South Korea are crude oil and petrochemical products. “One third of our crude oil is coming from Saudi Arabia,” said the ambassador.
Lee said that Korean companies had a major role in the infrastructure of Saudi Arabia’s many projects during its first economic boom in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
He added that Korean construction companies — which are now signing contracts in Dubai — were reluctant to return to the Kingdom after leaving over 20 years ago.
“Many Korean companies had a bad experience in delayed payments or sometimes no payment,” the ambassador said.
In other areas such as joint ventures in petrochemical industries, Korean companies have been given assurances from the Saudi government.
Asked about the bidding of Korean companies for the Kingdom’s second landline deal, he said there was still “concern” from the Korean side regarding the stability of the Saudi financial market.
“If they would like to join the bidding, they have to sell their shares in an IPO in the capital market,” he said.
He described the Saudi Capital Market as “volatile,” saying that these companies needed to borrow money from other markets to enter the Saudi market, without any assurances.
