The "Korea-Taiwan Parliamentarians Friendship Association" team visited Taiwan in a low-key manner from the 28th to the 31st of last month. From the left are the vice-chairman of the South Korea Assembly, Chung Woo-taek, the president of the "Korean-Taiwan Parliamentarians Friendship Association", Cho Kyung-tae, member of the National Power Councilor Li Dak-kun, and the Democratic Party of Korea Councilor Li Yuanxu.

(Taken from Li Dakun's Facebook page)

[Reporter Yang Chengyu/Taipei Report] Zheng Yuze, deputy speaker of the South Korea Assembly, visited the "Korea-Taiwan Parliamentarians Friendship Association" at the end of last month, which triggered strong protests from China and also showed that Taiwan-South Korea relations may be closer.

Dong Siqi, deputy executive director of a Taiwan think tank, analyzed that South Korean President Yin Xiyue has paid more attention to Taiwan after he took office; Taiwan-South Korea relations are vaguely developing in the direction of more active cooperation, especially on the two major issues of supply chain and security.

Chairman Cho Kyung-tae of the "Korea-Taiwan Councilors Friendship Association" of the South Korea Council, and four cross-party congressmen, including Vice-President Cheng Woo-taek of the South Korea Council, organized a delegation to visit Taiwan from December 28th to 31st. Promote the exchange of views on various important cooperation issues between Taiwan and South Korea.

This actually triggered fierce protests from the Chinese embassy in South Korea. Zhao Qingtai criticized China for interfering in South Korea's internal affairs and demanded that Chinese ambassador to South Korea Xing Haiming apologize for his inappropriate remarks.

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Dong Siqi pointed out that after Yin Xiyue came to power, he first strengthened relations with the United States, and at the same time actively improved relations with Japan.

Regarding the Taiwan issue, although Yin Xiyue mentioned the importance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait when U.S. President Joe Biden visited South Korea for talks in May last year, he did not directly mention the relationship with Taiwan.

The most important factor is still to take into account China.

However, Dong Siqi believes that Yin Xiyue's emphasis on Taiwan has increased after he came to power, which can be seen from South Korea's previous plan to appoint Jin Yongyou, a four-star reserve general who was once the chief of staff, as the representative in Taiwan. It is obvious that Yin Xiyue intends to strengthen security issues. Exchange or cooperation with Taiwan. At the same time, this may also mean that the United States hopes to strengthen relations between South Korea and Taiwan. After all, several hot spots in East Asia that have attracted much attention, apart from the Taiwan Strait, are the Korean Peninsula.

Regarding the low-key visit to Taiwan by members of the South Korean Congress, Dong Siqi said that Zhao Qingtai, the chairman of the "Korean-Taiwan Parliamentarians Friendship Association", has served as the chairman for a long time and has very good contacts and relationships in Taiwan.

Members of Taiwan and South Korea have frequent and positive exchanges, but they are not as fanciful as visiting delegations of members of Congress from other countries, and they may really have concerns about China's ideas.

Dong Siqi explained that some parts of South Korea still need China's assistance in dealing with the North Korean issue; however, members of South Korea's parliament also expressed dissatisfaction with the Chinese ambassador to South Korea's inappropriate speech.

He pointed out that in the past 20 years, South Korea and China have enjoyed a trade surplus for a long time, but now they oppose China's trade deficit.

Therefore, although South Korea still believes that China's interests are very important, it has begun to diverge on economic issues; at the same time, if China cannot meet or meet South Korea's expectations or demands on security issues, South Korea-China relations may no longer exist. Proceed in the same way as before.

Against such a background, Dong Siqi believes that Taiwan and South Korea were originally a competitive relationship, but recently on the two major issues of supply chain and security, in terms of high-tech industry and chip supply chain, the United States hopes that Taiwan, Japan and South Korea will cooperate with the United States; On security issues, the U.S. cooperates with Japan and South Korea, and seems to be happy to see more exchanges between Taiwan and South Korea.

Therefore, under such a background, after Yin Xiyue came to power, the relationship between Taiwan and South Korea vaguely developed in the direction of more active cooperation.

Dong Siqi also mentioned that before the epidemic, Taiwan and South Korea were each other's third largest source of inbound countries, and the mutual visits of both sides exceeded one million.

Despite the impact of the epidemic, there are still positive developments in cooperation or interaction between the two parties, such as the signing of the "Memorandum of Understanding on Mutual Recognition of International Driving Licenses between Taiwan and South Korea", the "Agreement on the Avoidance of Double Taxation of Income Taxes and the Prevention of Tax Evasion", etc.

Therefore, whether it is personnel exchanges or business exchanges, it is moving in a more convenient and mutually beneficial direction.

Dong Siqi pointed out that during the tenure of President Tsai Ing-wen, the relationship between Taiwan and South Korea was not affected by the relationship between South Korea and China; and after the emergence of the US-China confrontation pattern, South Korea has gradually realized that it used to have expectations of China on security issues, but now it seems America is more important.

Therefore, although cooperation with Taiwan still needs to be cautious, there are many parts related to national interests that will be substantially promoted.

In the overall international atmosphere, supply chain and security are the two most important issues.

Dong Siqi bluntly said that the situation on the Korean Peninsula was more serious than that on the two sides of the Taiwan Strait throughout last year. Therefore, with more emphasis on security issues, the security issues of neighboring countries have become more important to South Korea.

Therefore, the next part that Taiwan and South Korea can actively strive for cooperation is, first, how to cooperate with the United States in the high-tech industrial chain; second, how Taiwan and South Korea can share information on regional security issues.