Roundup: S. Korean president announces comprehensive cooperation with Africa

South Korea is committed to sharing with Africa its cumulative experiences, knowledge and mind-set to build a collaborative partnership for mutual growth and prosperity, South Korean President Park Geun-hye said Friday in her address at the African Union (AU) Headquarters in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa.

"Today, I would like to present a new initiative called the 'Blueprint for Comprehensive Cooperation with Africa' and share with you what Korea aspires to do together with Africa in its journey towards realizing Agenda 2063," said the president.

The new initiative covers various areas of South Korea's collaboration with Africa as the continent endeavors to realize Agenda 2063.

In the initiative, the president has expressed South Korea's keen interest to cooperate with Africa in major areas including experience sharing, education and human resource development, social and economic cooperation, and peace and security among others.

"First, Korea will share various development experiences learned from our own trials and errors over the last half century," said the president, who is on a state visit to Ethiopia as her first leg to four-nation trip in Africa and France.

She said she would pursue a "plan for two-way exchanges of 10,000 youths" as a way to expand job opportunities for young Africans.

"Over the next five years, 6,000 talented Africans will be offered education and training opportunities in either Korea or Africa, and 4,000 Korean volunteers will be sent to Africa," she said.

She also announced her country's plan to establish technology innovation centers in Africa to share experiences in creative innovation and leverage South Korea's strengths in information and communication technology (ICT) and science and technology.

Recalling that South Korea promptly dispatched medical team to Sierra Leone in the fight against Ebola and also her country's support to Sudan's schistosomiasis eradication project, Park said South Korea would continue its contribution to health sector in Africa based on past experiences.

The president said South Korea would also collaborate with Africa in responding to climate change.

She further expressed South Korea's hope to build a "mutually beneficial and future-oriented economic cooperation" with Africa, adding that South Korea has already forged win-win partnerships for economic cooperation in many quarters of the world, with numerous examples of success.

"Currently, a number of Korean companies have set foot in Africa to promote mutually beneficial economic cooperation by creating jobs and transferring technologies," she said.

Regarding security, Park noted that South Korea would work enthusiastically with the international community to build sustainable peace and stability in Africa.

"To help protect the peace in Africa, Korea has dispatched a UN peacekeeping force to Somalia in 1993, and subsequently to Western Sahara, Angola and most recently South Sudan where an engineering unit with over 290 service members is now stationed," she noted.

"Moreover, we will continue the fight against piracy in Africa as well as pursue an expansion of our PKO (peacekeeping operation) deployment," she added.

The president said she would further reinforce and broaden the existing institutional foundations that link South Korea and Africa in order to build a stronger partnership with Africa.

The Korea-Africa Forum, a meeting between foreign ministers and whose fourth forum to be held in Addis Ababa this year, has become a venue for communication that fosters mutual trust between the two sides, according to the president.

Welcoming the South Korean president to AU, which is the first ever visit by the country's head of state to the pan-African bloc, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Chairperson of the AU Commission, said in developing Africa's 50-year plan, the continent looked to South Korea and other developing nations for inspiration

"We will look to this partnership (with South Korea) to strengthen our expertise and programmes in manufacturing, infrastructure, maritime, amongst other mutually identified priority areas," noted Dlamini-Zuma. Park arrived in Addis Ababa later Wednesday. Endit