South Korea’s Yoon to attend ASEAN, G20 meetings

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol is set to attend meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Group of 20 industrialized nations this month.

“We are arranging summits with key countries on the occasion of attending the ASEAN and G20 meetings,” Yoon’s national security adviser, Kim Sung-han, told a briefing.

Reports say South Korea is arranging a possible bilateral summit between Yoon and U.S. President Joe Biden as well as a trilateral summit involving the United States and Japan on the sidelines of the events.

Nothing has been decided regarding a possible one-on-one meeting between Yoon and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Yonhap said.

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The latest in-person meeting between Yoon and Kishida was in September in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly and was the first between leaders of the two countries since 2019.

The two leaders agreed then on the need to improve relations dogged by historical disputes.

Yoon, who took office in May, has been keen to improve relations with Tokyo at a time when both countries face North Korea’s evolving nuclear and missile threats.

Zainab Sa’id