Korea Seeks to Export T-50 to Poland

President Park Geun-hye held a summit with her Polish counterpart Bronislaw Komorowski, Tuesday, and agreed to establish a strategic partnership between the two countries.

Korea is the second strategic partner of Poland in Asia after China. This means that the country will be able to take part in sectors including defense and IT industries under preferential terms. Korea has sought to export its T-50 Golden Eagle trainer.

Komorowski, who took office on Aug. 2010, paid a state visit to Korea at the invitation of Park. He is the first European state guest since Park’s inauguration in February.

“Park proposed that Seoul and Warsaw further develop bilateral cooperation in practical terms as strategic partners and Komorowski welcomed this,” said an official at Cheong Wa Dae.

“Park also asked for Komorowski’s support for Korean companies in Poland at a time of a revision of the double taxation agreements.”

Last year, Korea exported products, mostly high-tech items such as liquid crystal displays and optical devices, worth $3.68 billion to Poland last year while importing goods valued at $530 million.

As a result, Korea chalked up $3.13 billion trade surplus, the second largest with the European Union.

The two also signed a pact on collaboration in defense, which observers point out will help Korean players in Poland, which is seeking cutting-edge defense technology.

Poland currently is seeking to strengthen its defense by upgrading its trainer jets, submarines, patrol aircraft and helicopters.

Asia’s No. 4 economy has tried to export the T-50 Golden Eagle, the supersonic trainer developed by Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI), after signing its first deal for 16 airplanes with Indonesia in 2011.  

After becoming the world’s sixth country to export supersonic jets, Korea strives to win a $10 billion U.S. Air Force deal to replace the long-serving Northrop T-38C Talon with new trainers.

If Korea can strike another export deal on top of its Indonesian one, it is expected to boost the nation’s goal of garnering the mega-sized deal in the United States, bidding for which will start next year.

Cheong Wa Dae explained that the summit with Komorowski marks the start of Park’s “sales diplomacy” with European nations aimed at underpinning Korean firms there.

She will soon visit France, the United Kingdom and Belgium to have summits with their leaders as well meet as top officials of the European Union.  

“Thus far, Park has focused on Southeast Asian countries including Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines in pushing her initiative of sales diplomacy,” a presidential office official said.

“With the meeting with Komorowski and the scheduled ones with other European leaders, she will expand her horizon beyond Asia to Europe.”

He said that the summit will be a stepping stone in attaining Park’s recently-announced goal of building a railway and road from South Korea to Europe via North Korea, Russia and China.

Calling it the “Silk Road Express,” Park said that the trans-Siberian infrastructure will be possible based on her flagship North Korean policy of engaging the Stalinist regime without tolerating its provocations.
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