1. Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se will attend ASEAN-related Foreign Ministers’ meetings in Vientiane, Laos, from July 24 to 26.

◦ Minister Yun will participate in five ASEAN-related Foreign Ministers’ meetings: the Foreign Ministers’ Meetings of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), East Asia Summit (EAS), and ASEAN+3 (the Republic of Korea, China and Japan); and an ASEAN-ROK and Mekong-ROK Foreign Ministers’ Meetings.

* Schedule of the ASEAN-related Foreign Ministers’ meetings
- July 24 16:45-17:45 6th Mekong-ROK Foreign Ministers’ Meeting
- July 25 09:00-10:00 19th ASEAN-ROK Foreign Ministers’ Meeting
- July 26 09:00-10:30 17th ASEAN+3 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting 
             10:45-12:45 6th EAS Foreign Ministers’ Meeting 
             14:00-16:15 23rd ARF Foreign Ministers’ Meeting (Retreat Session) 
             16:30-17:30 23rd ARF Foreign Ministers’ Meeting (Plenary Session)

2. Minister Yun will take the opportunity of the meetings to further consolidate the ROK’s strategic partnership with ASEAN in 2016, when the ASEAN Community has been launched. At the meetings, the Minister will reaffirm the ROK’s commitment to step up cooperation with ASEAN and its member countries in political and social affairs, security, economy and culture.

3. At the meetings, the ROK government will stress that amid the growing nuclear threats from North Korea, the international community should continue sending to North Korea unified messages of firm non-tolerance for a nuclear North Korea, and working together, including by thoroughly implementing UN Security Council Resolution 2270, to create a circumstance where North Korea cannot but change for the better.

4. At the ARF Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, which will bring together delegates from 27 countries, including the ASEAN member states, the US, Japan, China, Russia, North Korea, Canada, Australia, and the EU, the delegates will exchange views on regional and global issues, including those concerning the North Korean nuclear program, the situation on the Korean Peninsula, the South China Sea, terrorism and violent extremism. They will also review the ARF’s confidence-building measures and preventive diplomacy as well as the way forward for the ARF.

° Minister Yun will express the commitment of the ROK to play a leading role in efforts to step up cooperation in the region in crisis management and response as a co-chair of the inter-sessional meeting on disaster relief, one of the four main areas of cooperation on confidence-building and preventive diplomacy.

5. At the Foreign Ministers’ Meeting of the EAS, the premier strategic forum participated by major countries in the region, the participants will discuss ways to work together in meeting traditional and non-traditional security threats facing the international community, including the North Korean nuclear issue, and ways to better institutionalize the EAS.

° Minister Yun will inform the other participants of the seminar on ways to build capacity against violent extremism, which the ROK and Indonesia are planning to co-hold in 2016 in a follow-up on the ROK-led statement on countering violent extremism and healthcare security adopted at the EAS Summit in 2015. He will also call for joint efforts to eradicate terrorism, which has been frequently committed of late, including in Nice, France.

6. At the Foreign Ministers’ Meeting of the ASEAN+3, a signature, functional cooperative mechanism that brings together the ten ASEAN member countries plus the ROK, Japan, and China, the participants will review the progress in the cooperation among the ASEAN+3 countries in such areas as finance, food security, employment and tourism pursuant to the “ASEAN Plus Three Cooperation Work Plan (2016-2020).” They will also discuss the way forward for cooperation among the member countries of the ASEAN+3, which will mark the 20th anniversary of its launch in 2017.

◦ Minister Yun will ask the member states of the ASEAN+3 to make joint efforts for the outcome of the implementation of the follow-up measures to the report issued by the ROK-led East Asia Vision Group II (EAVG II) to be submited to the ASEAN+3 Summit in 2016.

7. At the ASEAN-ROK Foreign Ministers’ Meeting between the ROK and the ten ASEAN member states, the ROK will highlight the importance of ASEAN, which has emerged as the ROK’s important diplomatic partner. The participants will review the progress in bilateral cooperation across the board, including political and social affairs, security, economy and culture; and the way forward for the ROK-ASEAN relations in the wake of the launch of the ASEAN Community in late 2015.

° The participants will review the progress in the implementation of measures to attain the vision of building “a partnership of trust and happiness” agreed upon at the 2014 ASEAN-ROK Commemorative Summit held to celebrate the 25th anniversary of dialogue relations and in the implementation of the “ASEAN-ROK Plan of Action 2016-2020" adopted at the ASEAN-ROK Foreign Ministers’ meeting in August 2015, thereby further strengthening the ROK-ASEAN strategic partnership.

8. The Mekong-ROK Foreign Ministers’ Meeting between the ROK and the five countries in the Greater Mekong Subregion -- Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam -- will cover ways to achieve sustainable development and growth and to narrow the development gap in the region; the progress in the implementation of the ROK-Mekong Plan of Action for 2014-2017; and the future direction of bilateral cooperation.

° In particular, the two sides will take note of the fact that since the Mekong Institute was designated in 2015 as the overseer of the ROK-Mekong Cooperation Fund, the Fund’s operational efficiency has improved; seek out joint development cooperation projects with major donor countries; and discuss ways to implement the ROK’s four main initiatives for development cooperation in the Mekong region.

9. On the sidelines of the ASEAN-related meetings, Minister Yun will hold bilateral meetings with his counterparts from major countries.


* unofficial translation