South Korean Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki (right)and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen greet with a fist bump ahead of their talks in Venice, Italy, on the sidelines of the Group of 20 meeting of top finance and economic officials on Friday. (Yonhap)
Top economic policymakers of South Korea and the United States have held talks over bilateral economic cooperation and global issues, the finance ministry said Saturday.
Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen held the meeting in Venice, Italy, on Friday (local time) on the sidelines of the Group of 20 (G-20) meeting of top finance and economic officials, according to the Ministry of Economy and Finance.
They shared the need for efforts to swiftly produce tangible results over follow-up measures to the Korea-U.S. summit held in May, including vaccine cooperation.
Hong expressed South Korea's intent to cooperate for a U.S.-backed global infrastructure initiative, called the Build Back Better World (B3W), for developing countries.
Both countries also agreed to cooperate on the issue of Iran's funds frozen in Seoul. South Korea is seeking to use a Swiss channel backed by the U.S. in a bid to use part of the money for Swiss companies' sale of humanitarian items to Iran.
The finance chiefs also discussed major G-20 agenda items, including climate change and the overhaul of a global corporate tax scheme, according to the ministry.
Hong held separate meetings with Turkey's Finance Minister Lutfi Elvan and his Italian counterpart, Daniele Franco, to discuss ways to bolster economic cooperation. (Yonhap)