Story by Oleen Ndori, Foreign Desk Editor
ZIMBABWE and South Korea are eagerly waiting for the Korea-Africa Summit set for June to enhance economic cooperation between the two countries.
2024 marks 30 years of diplomatic ties between Zimbabwe and South Korea with the two countries diversifying areas of cooperation.
After paying a courtesy call on Foreign Affairs and International Trade Minister, Ambassador Frederick Shava at his Munhumutapa offices in Harare this Wednesday, South Korea’s Ambassador to Zimbabwe, His Excellency Pak Jae-Kyung said his country is looking towards engaging Harare at the Korea-Africa Summit set for Seoul in June.
“2024 marks the 30th anniversary of Zimbabwe-Korea diplomatic relations. Ongoing, are many diverse events and programs, including the Taekwondo-Korea martial arts demonstration team will come in September this year. At the same time, we discussed the summit meeting in June, Korea, the Africa-Korea summit meeting. We look forward to His Excellency President Emerson Mnangagwa’s presence at the meeting, together with the Honourable Minister. The economic cooperation, including energy, infrastructure, and agriculture, ICT, will be the core issues of the summit meeting. The Africa-Korea Summit is multilateral, but at the same time, there will be a deep and intensive bilateral discussion through bilateral summit meetings as well,” he said.
Ambassador Shava also met the Swiss top envoy to Zimbabwe, His Excellency Stephanie Rey, and the two deliberated on the support that Geneva can give to Harare regarding disaster response.
“We went through the question of natural disasters in Zimbabwe and the response we can help Zimbabwe design together with us. As you may know, Zimbabwe qualifies for a big payout from the African Risk Capacity, which is an African Union-supported project that Switzerland has contributed to, adding up to the Zimbabwean premium. And now the first pay-out of 8.8 million dollars has been approved for Zimbabwe, which is good news for the drought. And out of this 8.8 million, 2.3 million derive directly from the Swiss contribution of 800,000 dollars that we paid at the beginning of this year. So this is encouraging news. We see that the international community is here also to support Zimbabwe if it so wishes, and we are looking forward to continuing the great cooperation we are having with your wonderful country,” said Ambassador Shava.
Meanwhile, Real Estate Developer Mr Ken Sharpe has been appointed Zimbabwe’s honourary Consul to Kazakhstan and presented his letters of credence to the Foreign Minister and he promised to establish ties with the Euro-Asian country.
Zimbabwe is continuing with its engagement and re-engagement drive for economic growth.
