US President Joe Biden will host Japanese Prime Minister Kishida and South Korean President Yoon at Camp David for a tripartite summit on Friday. The summit meeting will mark “a new era in trilateral cooperation among our countries,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters on Tuesday.
“I just spoke this morning with my counterparts from Japan and Korea, Foreign Minister Hayashi, Foreign Minister Park, to continue to prepare for the summit meeting,” he noted.
“This summit comes at a moment when our region and the world are being tested by geopolitical competition, by climate crisis, by Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, by nuclear provocations.
“Our heightened engagement is part of our broader efforts to revitalize, to strengthen, to knit together our alliances and partnerships, and in this case to help realize a shared vision of an Indo-Pacific that is free and open, prosperous, secure, resilient, and connected. “And what we mean by that is a region where countries are free to chart their own path and define their own partners, where problems are dealt with openly, where rules are reached transparently and applied fairly, and where goods, ideas, and people can flow lawfully and freely,” Secretary Blinken pointed out.
“Japan and South Korea are core allies, not just in the region, but around the world. Strengthening our trilateral cooperation is critical to delivering for our people, for the region, and for the world. It’s a force multiplier for good. “It helps us promote peace and stability and furthers our commitment to the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
“It advances our shared values and helps uphold principles of the UN Charter like sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity. It allows us to even more expand opportunity and prosperity. That’s why President Biden is hosting this historic meeting. “The first time foreign leaders have visited Camp David since 2015. The first standalone summit ever between our three countries,” Blinken went on.
“Together, the leaders will have an opportunity to discuss and to strengthen practical cooperation on a variety of shared priorities from physical security to economic security, from humanitarian assistance to development finance, from global health to critical and emerging technologies. “This is something that I’ve been working on closely for many, many years, building collaboration among the United States, Japan, and South Korea, and I take this back to my time as deputy secretary,” he added.
Source: Kuwait News Agency