Moon to meet with China, Russia leaders at G-20 summit

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SEOUL. KAZINFORM - President Moon Jae-in will hold summits with the leaders of China and Russia on the sidelines of a meeting of Group of 20 countries set for Japan next week, the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae said Friday, Yonhap reports.

Moon will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin on the fringe of the G-20 summit slated for Osaka on June 28 and 29. Moon will embark on a three-day trip there Thursday.

He will also hold summits with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Indonesian President Joko Widodo, it added.

Xi held a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un over the North's denuclearization in Pyongyang on Thursday. Kim met with Putin in late April in Vladivostok.

The Kim-Xi summit came as denuclearization talks between the United States and North Korea have stalled following the breakdown of the summit between Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump in February in Vietnam.

Trump will visit South Korea late this month after attending the G-20 summit.

Moon may focus on grasping North Korea's real intentions through his meeting with Xi and Putin, and then at the upcoming summit with Trump, he may seek to highlight the need for a third summit between Trump and Kim.

On the subject of skepticism about Moon's push for a summit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Ko Min-jung, Moon's spokesperson, said, "We are keeping the door open to a Korea-Japan summit."

Japan strongly indicated Abe won't hold a one-on-one meeting with Moon during the G-20 session, as he's displeased with the Moon government's attitude toward Japan's wartime forced labor.

Many Koreans were forced to toil at Japanese factories during World War II. Korea was subject to brutal Japanese colonization from 1910-1945. South Korean courts ordered the relevant Japanese firms to provide compensation for the forced labor.

Early this week, South Korea proposed to Japan that companies from both nations set up a joint fund to compensate the forced labor victims, but Tokyo effectively rejected the offer.

"(At the G-20 summit), Moon will stress the need for international cooperation and policy coordination to stabilize the global financial system and ease trade frictions, and plans to explain the government's push to build an innovative and inclusive nation and peace efforts with North Korea," Ko added.

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