President Moon's 100th Summit Call... Demonstrating the Power of 'Phone Diplomacy' Amid the COVID-19 Crisis

This Year’s Call Frequency Surges... President Trump Tops with 24 Calls

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Chun-han] On the 4th, President Moon Jae-in spoke with Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar to discuss cooperation measures in response to the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19).

With this call, President Moon reached exactly 100 calls with foreign leaders or heads of international organizations since his inauguration. This is the result of actively pursuing international solidarity through telephone diplomacy with foreign leaders during key phases such as the Korean Peninsula peace process and COVID-19 response.

In his first year in office in 2017, President Moon made a total of 37 calls. Starting with a call to U.S. President Donald Trump on May 10, the day after the presidential election, he held 17 calls with leaders including the four major powers?China, Japan, and Russia?in May alone. In 2018, there were 22 calls, and last year, 10 instances of 'telephone diplomacy' took place.

This year, the number of calls increased sharply due to the impact of COVID-19. Beginning with a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping on February 20, President Moon held 31 calls up to the call with Prime Minister Varadkar on this day, focusing on joint responses to COVID-19.

The countries and international organization leaders President Moon has spoken with since the COVID-19 outbreak, in order, are China, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Turkey, France, Sweden, Spain, Saudi Arabia, United States, Canada, Lithuania, Ethiopia, Bulgaria, Colombia, Denmark, Vietnam, Peru, World Health Organization (WHO), Australia, Poland, Estonia, India, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Bhutan, United States, Indonesia, Finland, South Africa, Austria, and Ireland. Additionally, on the 10th of last month, he also spoke with Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft and chairman of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, expanding his outreach to the private sector.

In addition to these diplomatic achievements, President Moon laid the foundation for international cooperation by hosting the G20 Special Video Summit on March 26 and the ASEAN+3 (Korea-China-Japan) Special Video Summit on the 14th of last month. At the G20 Special Video Summit, President Moon emphasized the importance of international cooperation, stating, "With the united solidarity of G20 member countries, we can overcome today's difficulties."

Meanwhile, since President Moon's inauguration in 2017, the leader he has spoken with most frequently is President Trump, with a total of 24 calls. This is attributed to the special nature of the Korea-U.S. alliance and the need for active communication due to the progress in the Korean Peninsula peace process, including three inter-Korean summits and two North Korea-U.S. summits. The two leaders also spoke on March 26 and April 18 to discuss cooperation measures in response to COVID-19.

The second most frequent calls were with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, totaling 12 calls. However, the last call with Prime Minister Abe was in April 2018. Following that, President Moon held four calls each with Chinese President Xi Jinping, French President Emmanuel Macron, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

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