Liu Yandong meets with South Korean president on ties, peninsula issue

Chinese President Xi Jinping's special envoy Liu Yandong met here on Monday with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, urging efforts to boost ties consistent with the original intention of both sides in establishing diplomatic relations.

China and South Korea should take the 10th anniversary of the establishment of their strategic cooperative partnership as an opportunity to earnestly implement the consensus reached by and between the heads of state of the two countries, Liu said.

Liu met with Moon after attending the Feb. 25 closing ceremony of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. She noted that the attendance to the Feb. 9 opening ceremony by Xi's special envoy Han Zheng, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, and her presence at the closing ceremony well reflect China's support for the PyeongChang games and the importance China attaches to its relations with South Korea.

During the meeting with Moon, Liu said China and South Korea should keep boosting mutual trust, launch mutually beneficial cooperation, strengthen exchange in education, science and technology, culture, sports, public health and other fields of humanities, and properly handle sensitive issues, in order to consolidate the political basis and the basis of public opinions for long-term stable development of relations between the two countries.

On the Korean Peninsula issue, Liu recalled that South Korea and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) took the PyeongChang Olympics as an opportunity to restart dialogue and interaction, revealing the common aspiration for peace of the people on the Korean Peninsula.

China is dedicated to peaceful solution of the Korean Peninsula issue through dialogue and consultation, Liu said.

Liu expressed the hope that the South Korean side will enhance confidence, eliminate interferences, keep promoting continued improvement of relations between the south and the north, and keep the current momentum of detente, in striving to make progress in peace talks.

China will continue to play a positive and constructive role on the issue, she added.

(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)