Xi Jinping's Visit to South Korea and Its Implications

시진핑(習近平) 국가주석의 방한과 한·중 미래 전략적 협력 동반자 관계

On July 3~4, 2014, the Chinese President Xi Jinping's state visit to Seoul might be seen as a step on the path toward strategic outcomes for both country. For South Korea, Seoul shrewdly retains some degree of self-reliance by balancing between ROK-China strategic cooperative partnership relationship and ROK-US alliance. For China, Beijing appears to put its interests on the Korean Peninsula increasingly within China's larger geopolitical influence. To what extent can ROK-China relationship maintain futuristic strategic cooperative partnership between them? As we observed joint press communiques of the Chinese President Xi Jinping's state visit on July 3, 2014, four agendas of bilateral relationship between Seoul and Beijing can be identified: intractable rivalry between the two great powers, North Korea nuclear issues, disparities of their displeasure with Japan denying the past wrongdoing and enhancing its military capabilities and Chinese imposing of its core interests on its Korea policy. With these evolving strategic environments, however, China and the ROK appear justifiably be pleased with the state of their relations: their strategic cooperative partnership is the cornerstone of peace and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific or Indo-Pacific region and continues to grow broader and deeper.