China reaches out to South Korea with late invite to global trade meeting
Seoul was initially left off the guest list for the Belt and Road Summit amid tensions over its deployment of a US anti-missile system
China has invited South Korea to a summit on a global trade initiative in Beijing in what appears to be the latest move to repair a strained relationship and reach out to the new South Korean president.
A delegation led by a lawmaker of the South’s ruling Democratic Party, Park Byeong-seug, will attend the Belt and Road Summit in the Chinese capital on Sunday and Monday, according to a diplomatic source and a South Korean media report.
South Korea was not initially invited to the gathering, at which China will showcase to world leaders its ambitious project to expand global trade with billions of dollars of infrastructure investment. Observers said recent tensions over Seoul’s deployment of a US missile defence system were behind that decision.
“An official invitation came from China recently,” South Korea’s Yonhap news agency quoted a government official in Seoul as saying. China’s foreign ministry didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The shift in stance came one day after President Xi Jinping spoke to new South Korean President Moon Jae-in to congratulate him on his appointment.