Seoul, Washington strike different tones after brief meeting of top diplomats

A relatively brief meeting between the top diplomats of Korea and the United States ended without a breakthrough on key issues as difficult negotiations over Korea’s U.S. investment package spilled into starkly different accounts of the talks from Seoul and Washington.

The meeting between Foreign Minister Cho Hyun and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington on Friday lasted about 50 minutes.

The meeting was relatively brief compared with previous standalone bilateral meetings between the two countries' top diplomats, which have typically lasted around an hour or longer. Their previous formal meeting in the United States in February also lasted about an hour. 

“The meeting between the two ministers ended relatively quickly,” a source from the ruling bloc told the JoongAng Ilbo on Sunday. “The idea was to time the meeting with the announcement of the first U.S. investment project and use that momentum to make progress on several pending issues, but things did not work out as envisioned.”

“With several issues to cover in a short period of time, the Korean side focused more on explaining the government’s various efforts than holding in-depth discussions.”

The government had initially sought to brief the National Assembly on the first U.S. investment project on Thursday, then sign a related memorandum of understanding on Friday, when Cho was scheduled to meet Rubio.

But the timeline was pushed back as last-minute negotiations dragged on over investment terms for projects including the Encinal combined-cycle gas power plant in Texas, the construction of eight nuclear reactors in the United States and the Alaska liquefied natural gas (LNG) project. That also derailed Cho’s attempt to use progress on the investment package as a springboard for advancing other issues at the meeting.

The two countries are now said to be facing considerable difficulty as they negotiate the wording of the MOU.

“Even a single word can change whether something means ‘we will start immediately’ or ‘we will consider it,’ so the two sides are going back and forth word by word,” a source said. “The issue is that the United States wants the language to be as binding as possible, while we want to keep it as noncommittal as possible.”

The Alaska LNG project, a proposed project to transport North Slope gas by pipeline for LNG exports, has been a particular sticking point. The United States reportedly wants the document to explicitly state that investment will move forward, while Korea wants language that offers flexibility contingent on the project’s commercial viability.

“I looked at the details [of the U.S. investment package], and there are some parts that are not easy for me to agree to,” President Lee Jae Myung said at a press conference Friday, amid the ongoing negotiations. 

The differences between the two sides, which failed to narrow their disagreements over trade issues, were also apparent in statements issued after the meeting.

Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs generally framed the discussions around what “the two ministers” agreed to discuss or coordinate, while the U.S. Department of State directly attributed its demands on sensitive issues to Rubio.

The two sides placed different emphasis on U.S.-bound investment from the outset.

“The two ministers agreed to work toward a successful outcome in the ongoing discussions on strategic investment projects in the United States,” the Foreign Ministry said.

The U.S. side, by contrast, said Rubio stressed the “swift execution of investment commitments from the 2025 Joint Fact Sheet.”

Korea thus emphasized ongoing discussions, while the United States put greater weight on implementing commitments that had already been made. The U.S. statement also emphasized cooperation in strategic sectors including semiconductors, which was not included in the Korean statement.

The two sides also differed in their descriptions of discussions over the Strait of Hormuz.

Cho “explained the Korean government’s willingness to make a substantive contribution to restoring freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz,” the Foreign Ministry said.

A senior Korean official said the United States made no specific request for Korea to deploy troops and that the U.S. side expressed understanding of Korea’s position.

The State Department, however, said Secretary Rubio “reiterated the importance of cooperating to secure freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz,” repeating Washington’s existing call for cooperation.

The U.S. statement also addressed an issue absent from Korea’s account of the meeting: U.S. companies operating in Korea.

The secretary "underscored the critical need for a fair, transparent, and equitable business environment for American companies operating in the Republic of Korea," the State Department said.

A senior Korean official said that no specific company, such as Coupang, was directly mentioned. Coupang emerged as a point of friction since Korean authorities launched an investigation into the company's data leak, while U.S. officials said the Delaware-incorporated company has been unfairly targeted.

“To narrow these differences, the first priority will be producing tangible results from the U.S. investment package quickly, before the November midterm elections, as the U.S. side wants,” the ruling bloc official said.

BY YOO JEE-HYE, YOON JI-WON [[email protected]]