Prime Minister Sobotka and South Korean President Park Geun-hye adopt action plan for Czech-Korean strategic partnership

Today, Thursday 3 December 2015, Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka and the President of the Republic of Korea, Park Geun-hye, discussed how to step up the mutual cooperation between their two countries. Their talks at Prague’s Liechtenstein Palace focused on economic cooperation, investments by Korean companies in the Czech Republic, and security issues.

Other items on the agenda were cooperation in science and technology, culture, infrastructure and tourism.

The main conclusion of the meeting is a two-year action plan for the implementation of the Czech-Korean strategic partnership, adopted by the Czech prime minister and the Korean president to fulfil and elaborate on the statement of strategic partnership between the Czech Republic and the Republic of Korea. The strategic partnership was adopted when Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka visited Korea in February this year.

The specific steps to implement the Strategic Partnership for 2016-2018 encompass the following areas:

1. Political and security cooperation
2. Economic cooperation
3. Cooperation in culture, tourism and exchanges

The meeting was also attended by the Deputy Prime Minister for Science, Research and Innovation, Pavel Bělobrádek, the Minister for Industry and Trade, Jan Mládek, and the Minister for Health, Svatopluk Němeček.

The Czech Republic established diplomatic relations with the Republic of Korea in 1990 and, in the course of the past 25 years, those relations have been set intensified significantly in numerous areas, with the Republic of Korea becoming one of the Czech Republic’s key partners in Asia.

President Park’s visit is the first by a president of the Republic of Korea to the Czech Republic for 20 years. In the afternoon, President Park Geun-hye will attend the V4 Summit, the central theme of which will be the development of cooperation between Visegrad Group countries and the Republic of Korea.