President Lee Myung-bak called for greater business collaboration between Korea and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations while visiting the southern resort island of Jeju for the ASEAN-Korea Commemorative Summit that begins Monday.
In his speech for the "CEO Summit" Sunday on the sidelines of the ASEAN gathering, President Lee also stressed the significant role of business leaders saying that Asia is emerging as a new axis of the global economy.
[Interview : President Lee Myung-bak] "Korea and ASEAN must establish a practical business community based on the quantitative growth in economic relations."
"During the special summit, the Korea-ASEAN FTA on investment is expected to be finalized. Now, we can move one step forward to the practical business community, while lowering the barrier for all fields, including product and service trade and investment."
The Prime Minister of Thailand, as the chair of ASEAN, then stressed the importance of cooperation between Korea and ASEAN amid the global economic crisis.
[Interview : Abhisit Vejjajiva, Thai Prime Minister] "The impact of the current crisis is still unfolding and may take sometime to assess its full implication. I believe that Asia will emerge relatively stronger and the world's economic dynamism will shift to Asia with East Asia as the hub. This is irreversible in spite of the crisis."
Following his keynote speech at the CEO Summit President Lee Myung-bak sat down with his Thailand counterpart for a bilateral summit.
The two leaders discussed bilateral financial collaborations between Korea and ASEAN.
They also touched on North Korea's nuclear test with both sides agreeing that Pyeongyang threatens regional and global stability with its nuclear program.
President Lee and the ASEAN chair also decided to put diplomatic efforts to bring Pyeongyang back to the six-party nuclear talks with the Thai prime minister pledging to bring the issue to the ASEAN Regional Forum.
[Reporter : Kim Bum-soo
] "The two-day-long ASEAN-Korea Commemorative Summit begins on Monday here in Jeju marking the 20-year-old ties between the two sides. President Lee will be joined by the ten leaders from the ASEAN member countries and discuss ways to further improve relations.
Kim Bum-soo, Arirang News, Jeju."
MAY 31, 2009
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Arirang Town
Wednesday, FEB 10, 2010, (KST) 
