Park travelling to U.S. and Mexico

President Park Geun-hye will leave for Washington Wednesday to attend a multilateral conference on nuclear security and to seek international cooperation in ending North Korea’s nuclear arms program.

Park will visit Washington from Wednesday through Saturday to attend the fourth Nuclear Security Summit. The conference will take place on Thursday and Friday, and leaders from 52 countries, the European Union, the United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will participate.

Park will highlight the need for global cooperation to counter evolving nuclear terrorism threats and stress the importance of the international community’s efforts to denuclearize North Korea at the summit, a senior Blue House official said.

It is anticipated that officials at the summit will discuss North Korea’s fourth nuclear test on Jan. 6 and long-range missile launch in February. U.S. President Barack Obama, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will attend the conference. Russian President Vladimir Putin, however, will not attend.

After the summit, Park will visit Mexico from Saturday to April 5. She will meet President Enrique Pena Nieto on April 4 to talk about a wide range of economic projects. The Blue House said 145 Korean businessmen from 144 companies will visit Mexico with Park.

BY SER MYO-JA [ser.myoja@joongang.co.kr]