PRESS RELEASE

Rail Bridge or Tunnel To Connect South Korea and China over the Yellow Sea

Nov. 19, 2014 (EIRNS)—South Korea plans to spend $316,000 for a feasibility study on a railway project crossing the Yellow Sea to China next year, reports China’s Global Times, quoting from the budget report released by South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. China Daily reports that Presidents Xi Jinping and Park Geun Hye, at their Summit in July, discussed the Xi’s New Silk Road as well as Park’s Eurasia Initiative for connectivity and energy cooperation between Korea, China and Russia.

The signing of the South Korea-China Free Trade agreement at the APEC meeting this month provided another basis for reviving the idea of a trans-Yellow Sea rail connection.

The project first appeared in 1998 when South Korea’s then president Kim Dae-jung signed an agreement on railway corporation with Beijing. President Park has supported the idea at least since her first (unsuccessful) presidential campaign in 2007.

Such a project would certainly also encourage Seoul to join the AIIB, which U.S. pressure has so far prevented.