UAE Minister of Culture: "I Want to Learn South Korea's COVID-19 Response Measures"

Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Park Yang-woo is exchanging opinions on cultural and artistic responses to COVID-19 between the two countries and the 2020 Korea-UAE Year of Mutual Cultural Exchange through a video conference with Noura Al Kaabi, Minister of Culture and Knowledge Development of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), on the 23rd at the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism Smart Work Center meeting room in Yongsan-gu, Seoul.
[Photo by Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Heung-soon] The Minister of Culture of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) expressed a desire to learn from the South Korean government's response measures to the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

Noura Al Kaabi, UAE Minister of Culture and Knowledge Development, stated during a virtual meeting with Park Yang-woo, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Korea, on the 23rd, "Korea is responding to COVID-19 quickly, accurately, and transparently, and the whole world wants to learn from this," adding, "The UAE is no exception."

Minister Park introduced, "Our country is rapidly identifying confirmed cases and contacts through creative methods such as drive-through testing, based on principles of openness, transparency, and minimizing restrictions on human and logistics movement," and added, "Even as COVID-19 improves under strengthened social distancing, we remain vigilant and respond swiftly to new challenges such as overseas re-importation."

The virtual meeting discussed the impact of COVID-19 on the culture and arts sectors, response measures, and the promotion of the '2020 Korea-UAE Mutual Cultural Exchange Year.'

In December last year, marking the 40th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries, the Ministries of Culture of Korea and the UAE designated 2020 as the Mutual Cultural Exchange Year and signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to promote joint and exchange events in various fields. However, due to the spread of COVID-19, cultural events scheduled for the first half of the year could not be carried out normally, and it was agreed to extend the period until 2021.

First, the Abu Dhabi Korean popular music (K-pop) festival planned for the first half of the year will be postponed to November. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism plans to prepare a special exhibition of Korean contemporary art (August to October) and a Taekwondo demonstration performance (October) in the UAE in the second half of the year. However, considering the spread of COVID-19, the decision on whether to proceed with the events will be continuously discussed.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.