SEOUL: South Korean President Lee Jae Myung held summit talks in Seoul on Monday (Feb 23) with Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the place they agreed to broaden cooperation in sectors together with commerce, key minerals, expertise and tradition.
The leaders plan to raise the bilateral relationship right into a strategic partnership, and for the international locations to work collectively to assist stability on the Korean Peninsula, Lee stated.
“Peace, constructed on situations the place battle is not wanted, is the strongest type of safety,” the South Korean president informed a joint press convention.
The leaders oversaw the signing of 10 memorandums of understanding (MOUs) spanning commerce and industrial coverage, core minerals, digital financial system together with AI, agriculture, well being and biotech, small-business exchanges and joint policing towards cybercrime, narcotics and different transnational threats.
In earlier remarks, Lee stated the 2 sides adopted a four-year motion plan to map out concrete steps for increasing bilateral cooperation, from strategic minerals to defence and area industries, in addition to meals safety.
Brazil is South Korea’s largest buying and selling companion in South America, making financial cooperation a key a part of the agenda.
Lula stated Brazil holds massive rare-earth reserves and has substantial nickel deposits, and that his authorities hoped to draw funding from South Korean firms.
In a message posted to X earlier within the day, Lee welcomed Lula, who’s in Seoul for his first state go to in 21 years, stating the similarities of their backgrounds.
“As a former little one labourer, you proved together with your entire life that democracy is probably the most highly effective instrument for social and financial progress,” Lee wrote.
“I assist your life, your wrestle and your achievements, which is able to stay ceaselessly within the historical past of world democracy.”
The leaders, who first met on the G7 summit in Canada final 12 months and later on the G20 summit in South Africa, seem to have bonded over shared experiences of childhood manufacturing unit work and office accidents.
The talks happened in South Korea’s presidential Blue Home, the primary large-scale official welcome ceremony to be held since Lee moved his workplace again to the constructing.
A state banquet is scheduled for Monday night the place barbecue dishes and Brazilian bossa nova items are as a consequence of be carried out by a Korean jazz band alongside a youngsters’s choir, Lee’s workplace stated.