The trade ministers of South Korea and China were set to hold a fresh round of negotiations on Thursday to try to wrap up a landmark free trade agreement, a senior Seoul negotiator said, ahead of a bilateral summit of their top leaders at the annual APEC forum.
South Korea’s trade minister, Yoon Sang-jick, and his Chinese counterpart, Gao Hucheng, will sit down for the 14th round of talks in Beijing later in the day as the level of top negotiators were upgraded to the ministers, a clear sign that the two nations are working hard to reach a deal.
Progress has been made in the previous rounds of talks, but the two nations have failed to make headway on sticky issues such as greater access to China’s protected financial and telecom services.
China also wants South Korea to open up more of its agricultural market.
Kim Young-moo, director-general for FTA negotiations at South Korea’s Trade Ministry leading the South Korean negotiating team in the free trade talks with China, told a group of Korean correspondents earlier this week that the two nations could find creative ways to resolve differences.
However, Kim was neither optimistic nor pessimistic about the prospects of sealing a deal before South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Chinese President Xi Jinping hold a bilateral meeting earlier next week on the sidelines of the APEC gathering.
“We leave open the possibility of reaching a deal before the bilateral summit, but there is also the possibility of failing to reach a deal by then,” he said.
As an indication of last-minute efforts for a deal, however, Kim said the Thursday talks between Yoon and Gao could be extended by a fews days until the Park-Xi summit.
South Korea and China have reached or are close to reaching deals on 16 of 22 areas in the free trade talks, but major differences remain in high-profile areas, including how to eliminate tariffs on goods, services market, non-tariff barriers and rules of origin, Kim said.
The two nations started their formal free trade negotiations in May 2012, and Park and Xi agreed to work together to achieve an agreement by the end of the year during their summit in early July.
Agriculture and fisheries are considered the most sensitive sectors for South Korea, while China categorizes its manufacturing industries, which include the automobile, machinery and oil sectors, as sensitive.
China accounts for more than 30 percent of South Korea’s exports. Two-way trade of goods between South Korea and China totaled about US$270 billion last year, according to Chinese government figures. (Yonhap)
