Indian Defence Minister, Rajnath Singh and South Korean Defence Minister, Suh Wook have inaugurated “Indo-Korean Bilateral Friendship Park” in Delhi Cantt on March 26, 2021. Friendship Park has been built to commemorate contribution of Indian peacekeepers in the Korean War from 1950 to 1953.
India-South Korea Relations
India-South Korea relations have strengthened in recent years with the convergence of Act East Policy (AEP) of India and New Southern Policy (NSP) of South Korea. Bilateral ties have frown multi-dimensional in the fields of Maritime security, nuclear disarmament, regional economic cooperation, counterterrorism and energy cooperation.
Background
India had played a crucial role in the Korean wars during 1950 to 1953. In the year 1947, India’s first foreign secretary, K P S Menon, served as Chairman of United Nations (UN) Commission which was set up to look after elections in South Korea. During the Korean War, warring sides accepted UN resolution which was sponsored by India to call a ceasefire.
Diplomatic ties
The official bilateral and diplomatic ties between both the countries was started in 1962 at the consular level. In 1973, the relation was upgraded to Ambassador-level.
Common Values
India and South Korea can cooperate on fighting global issues/challenges: climate change, freedom of navigation, internet governance, and outer space. Both the nation has also the potential to develop synergies on Sustainable development goals (SDGs), connectivity norms and trade agreements.
Challenges in ties
Economic partnership between both the countries is struck at $22 billion. Defence partnership has also receded from all-round promise to sale and purchase of weapon systems. Integration of Indians with local South Korean population is also a big challenge. Indians have witnessed racial prejudice or discrimination. Indians are unable to distinguish between cultural and social characteristics of South Koreans from cultural and social characteristics of Japanese or Chinese. Though, Indian Culture Centre (ICC) was established in Seoul to promote people-to-people contacts. But it has to reach an exponentially wider audience yet.