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President Islam Karimov meets Korean Finance Minister

11 January 2012 05:00 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Islam Karimov met with Minister of Strategy and Finance of the Republic of Korea Yoon Jeung-Hyun, in Oqsaroy, May 4, APA reports quoting Uzbekistan national News Agency.

Having welcomed the guest, the head of state expressed satisfaction with the high level of dynamically developing relations between Uzbekistan and South Korea and noted in particular: â€œI well remember our meeting in Seoul this February. It was a conversation pretty rich in content and important for us. We even decided to definitely meet in Tashkent in the course of Your participation in the ADB international forum. Today You are our welcome visitor and dear guest. And the fact that we have established quite confidential relations with President Lee Myung-bak furthermore underscores the closeness and trust-based cooperation that has been forming for many years between the Republic of Uzbekistan and the Republic of Koreaâ€.

Traditionally, the friendly cultural and economic ties between our countries, united by common interests and aspirations, are permeated with a spirit of strategic partnership and a determination to further strengthen amity between the two fraternal peoples. Regular Uzbek-Korean summits confirm this time and again. Bilateral contacts serve to jointly explore promising areas of cooperation and elaborate mutually beneficial projects in various spheres, particularly biggest of which are implemented in the hydrocarbon, mining, transport and logistics, banking and finance, and many other areas.

Republic of Korea is considered one of the most reliable and time-tested economic partners of Uzbekistan with a joint realization of a number of strategically important investment projects. One of them, in particular, is a free industrial and economic zone and international multimodal logistics center in Navoi. The cooperation with KOGAS Corporation is particularly noteworthy, especially in the construction of Ustyurt gas chemical complex aimed at not only field development with high-tech, but also production of ready products â€“ polyethylene and polypropylene. In the framework of this project it is intended to attract investments worth more than 3 billion US dollars.

As a result of the most favored nation regime in economic relations between Uzbekistan and South Korea, the volume of mutual trade turnover amounted to 1.2 billion US dollars in 2009 alone.

During the meeting in Oqsaroy, Yoon Jeung-Hyun expressed his sincere gratitude to the head of our nation for the warm welcome, stressing the Korean sideâ€™s interest in expanding the scales of mutually beneficial ties with Uzbekistan. Minister of Strategy and Finance of the Republic of Korea underpinned that Tashkent became the site for an international forum of Asian Development Bank owing primarily to the successfully implemented Uzbek model of development acknowledged by many leading countries as effective.

â€œIn the context of global financial and economic crisis Uzbekistan has demonstrated the robustness of protective mechanisms inherent in the national model of economy effectively applied today in practiceâ€, the guest emphasized.

Issues related to further enhancement of trade, economic and investment cooperation between Uzbekistan and the Republic of Korea have been discussed during the conversation.