South Korea, the United States, and Japan held a trilateral foreign ministers’ meeting in Bali, Indonesia, where the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting was held on the 8th.
The three foreign ministers’ meeting held at a resort in Bali this followingnoon was attended by Foreign Minister Park Jin, US Secretary of State Tony Blincoln, and Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi.
It is the first time in five months since the meeting in Hawaii in February that the trilateral foreign ministers’ meeting was held, and it is the first time under the new government of South Korea.
At the summit, it seems that the three-way cooperation plan to respond to North Korea’s escalating nuclear and missile threats was discussed as the main agenda.
The three countries held the first summit in four years and nine months on the occasion of the Spanish NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) summit on the 29th of last month and discussed ways to strengthen cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region to respond to the North Korean nuclear threat.
Meanwhile, the meeting was held shortly following the shocking incident in which former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot and died following falling into a cardiopulmonary arrest during an election campaign.
The meeting started regarding 30 minutes later than originally expected, and the ministers of the three countries, who entered the meeting room with a firm expression, did not shake hands but took a picture in front of their respective flags and sat down.
In response to a Japanese reporter’s question, Blincoln and Park also made mournful comments for Prime Minister Abe.
Minister Park noted that President Yun Seok-yeol expressed his deep condolences to Prime Minister Abe’s family and the Japanese people, and emphasized that “the Korean government strongly condemns this shooting as an unacceptable and violent crime under any circumstances.”
Secretary Blincoln expressed deep shock and lamented that former Prime Minister Abe was a ‘special partner’ and ‘a leader with a great vision’.
/yunhap news
