We start off with President Moon Jae-in, who is on his state visit to Uzbekistan.<br />The President will travel to one of the country’s oldest cities,… once considered the "heart of the Silk Road".<br />With that,... he will wrap up his trip and head over to Kazakhstan on Sunday,... for the last leg of his three-nation tour of Central Asia.<br />Traveling with the president,.. our Shin Se-min has this report. <br /> President Moon Jae-in... on the last full day of his visit in Uzbekistan... is set to visit the ancient city of Samarkand on Saturday.<br />His trip to the historic city... is a way of highlighting the two countries long relations... which dates back to the Silk Road era.<br /> Being one of the oldest cities in Uzbekistan and Central Asia as a whole,... the city is known to have been frequented by merchants from nearby nations,... including ancient Korean dynasties.<br />The South Korean leaders’ visit to the site comes... amid the backdrop of an upgrade in diplomatic relations,… with the two sides,... agreeing to create a special strategic partnership.<br />And such closer ties,… largely built up on the Moon administrations’ New Northern Policy initiative. <br /><br /> “The New Northern Policy is our economy’s efforts for market diversification aimed at innovative growth,… and is also a strategy to expand to foreign markets in the areas of traditional, high-tech and service industries.”<br /><br /> The leaders of the two sides have promised to further their cooperation to high-value added industries like the health and medical sector, ICT and public administration. <br />Addressing the Uzbekistan’s parliamentarians Friday,… President Moon said the history-rich country, once at the center of the Great Silk Road... is entering a new era of development.<br /> Saying that Uzbekistan’s development is linked to South Korea’s own,… Moon said Seoul will gladly share its experience of economic development with the Central Asian country. <br /> President Moon’s trip here in Uzbekistan will wrap up on Sunday,... and he will head for Kazakhstan,... the last stop of his three-nation tour in Central Asia. <br /><br />"The President’s visit to Samarkand,… one of the oldest inhabited cities in all of Central Asia,… is a way of highlighting the two countries’ bilateral cooperation for development projects and cultural heritage. Shin Se-min, Arirang News, Tashkent."<br />
