President Erdoğan: We can achieve important successes with South Korea

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan evaluated Türkiye-South Korea relations in his interview with Yonhap before his visit to Seoul upon the invitation of South Korean President Lee Jae Myung.

Emphasizing that the friendship between Türkiye and South Korea is based on solid historical foundations, Erdoğan underlined that this friendship sprouted during the difficult days of the Korean War and that it has not lost any of its value despite the intervening decades.

Erdoğan stated that brotherhood and mutual trust have been the basis of relations since those days and that it is our duty to carry this legacy strongly to future generations and said:

"Our priority during our visit to Seoul is to strengthen the political dialogue between the two countries and accelerate our economic relations. We see important opportunities in the fields of defense industry, nuclear energy, high technology, artificial intelligence and renewable energy. We want to turn these opportunities into concrete projects, pave the way for our companies and increase mutual investments. We have a volume target of 15 billion dollars in bilateral trade. While achieving this goal, we attach importance to giving our trade a more balanced structure, increasing investments and working more closely in the field of production."

Erdoğan expressed his belief that this visit will lead to concrete steps that will further the cooperation between the two countries.

Regarding the latest stage in the negotiations regarding the Sinop Nuclear Power Plant Project, Erdoğan underlined that the negotiations with South Korea on these issues are considered important.

Erdoğan said, "We know the experience of our Korean friends in the field of nuclear energy. Following the memorandum of understanding we signed last year, we carried out important studies with KEPCO within the scope of pre-feasibility. We continue our evaluations on the technical and economic conditions of the project and the investment model. At what cost the electricity will be produced, how the investment will be financed and what the project will bring to the Turkish economy will be decisive in the final decision." he said.

Underlining that contacts with other countries are also taken into account, Erdogan said that all options are evaluated in line with Türkiye's interests.

Source: TRT Haber Açık RSS (Gündem) (Open Press / Translated Full Text)