Minister of Environment meets with Kerry, US Climate Envoy, to strengthen carbon neutrality cooperation

First Meeting Since the Inauguration of the Biden Administration

Minister of Environment Han Jeong-ae is having a phone conversation with John Kerry, the U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, on the 26th in the minister's office at the Sejong Government Complex regarding mutual cooperation measures for achieving carbon neutrality.

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Joo Sang-don] Minister of Environment Han Jeong-ae and U.S. Climate Envoy John Kerry agreed through a bilateral meeting to strengthen the cooperative framework between the two countries for carbon neutrality.

On the 27th, the Ministry of Environment announced that Minister Han and Envoy Kerry held a bilateral meeting via phone call to discuss cooperation measures between the two countries in response to climate change.

First, Minister Han congratulated the inauguration of the new U.S. administration and warmly welcomed President Joe Biden's signing of the executive order to rejoin the Paris Agreement on his first day in office. She also expressed expectations that the U.S. return to the Paris Agreement would accelerate international efforts to address climate change and expand the implementation of carbon neutrality.

Envoy Kerry highly praised South Korea for establishing a long-term low-carbon development strategy aiming for carbon neutrality by 2050 at the end of last year.

Both sides shared the view that since the policy directions of the two countries for 2050 carbon neutrality are similar in many aspects, they should strengthen the cooperative framework by discovering joint projects for mutual development. They also reached a consensus to closely cooperate so that the two countries can lead international climate change issues on the global stage, including the upcoming G7 and G20 summits this year and the 26th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP26) to be held in Glasgow, UK, this November.

Envoy Kerry is a prominent politician who served as a U.S. Senator from Massachusetts from 1985 to 2013 and ran as the Democratic candidate in the 2004 U.S. presidential election. He was appointed as the presidential climate envoy on November 23 last year and began his term on the 20th of this month. The climate envoy serves as the president's special envoy overseeing energy and climate policies.