**■ President Holds Summit with President Erdoğan**
**President Heads to Ankara After G20**
“Expectations for Partnership in Defense Areas
Promoting Expansion in AI and Other Collaborations”
Minister of Industry and President of KEPCO Accompany
Middle East and North Africa, New Territory for K-Defense
‘Brothers Country’…
President Lee Jae-myung and First Lady Kim Hye-kyung wave before boarding the plane to Turkey, their next destination, at OR Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg, South Africa, on the 23rd. (Yonhap News)
‘Johannesburg/Ankara = Na Yoon-seok, Reporter’
After completing the G20 Summit in South Africa, President Lee Jae-myung will hold a summit with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on the 24th (local time). There is speculation that a memorandum of understanding (MOU) containing concrete results in the fields of defense industry, nuclear power, and artificial intelligence (AI) may be signed.
Having left Johannesburg, South Africa, on the afternoon of the 23rd, where the G20 summit was held, President Lee is scheduled to arrive in Ankara, Turkey, on the morning of the 24th. This will be his first summit with President Erdoğan since taking office. The two leaders are expected to focus on strengthening cooperation in various fields such as defense, nuclear power, and bio. Turkey, along with the U.S., U.K., and Canada, was one of the four major countries that dispatched troops during the Korean War. Since signing a contract with Korea in 2001 for ‘technology transfer and local production’ related to the K-9 self-propelled howitzer, Turkey has consistently collaborated with Korea in the defense sector. Turkey’s domestically produced T-155 Fırtına howitzers were made using K-9 technology. Similarly, Turkey’s next-generation main battle tank, the Altay tank, was developed based on the technology used for Korea’s K2 Black Panther tank.
Depending on the outcome of this visit, the Middle East and North Africa region, which President Lee has been visiting in succession since the 17th, is expected to emerge as a promising market for K-Defense. According to the ‘Trends and Implications of Defense Industry in Major Middle Eastern Countries’ report by the Korea Export-Import Bank’s Overseas Economic Research Institute, Korea’s arms exports to the Middle East increased more than threefold in five years, from $241.06 million in 2019 to $747.48 million last year. The presidential office is anticipating defense orders worth more than $15 billion (approximately 22 trillion KRW) through the summit with the UAE held on the 18th.
In a written interview with Turkey’s Anadolu Agency, President Lee stated, “Korea and Turkey can expand partnerships with next-generation defense technologies,” adding that “by integrating unmanned systems with existing platforms and advancing mobility and protection technologies, this objective can be achieved.” Additionally, the president announced plans to expand areas of cooperation between the two countries to future-oriented industries such as nuclear energy, bio-health, digital transformation, renewable energy, and artificial intelligence (AI), besides defense.
Regarding nuclear power, discussions are ongoing about Korean companies participating in the Sinop nuclear power project in Turkey. To achieve tangible outcomes related to this, Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Kim Jeong-gwan and KEPCO President Kim Dong-cheol are accompanying President Lee on this tour. There is also the possibility of signing memorandums of understanding (MOU) related to industrial cooperation following the summit.
Meanwhile, during this visit, President Lee’s schedule includes a state banquet, visiting the mausoleum of Turkey’s founding father Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, laying a wreath at the Korean War Memorial, and meeting with the Korean community.