South Korea Hosts Historic Central Asia Summit to Strengthen Economic and Strategic Ties

Kazakhstan's President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev shakes hands with South Korea's President Lee Jae Myung at the Blue House in Seoul, South Korea, on September 15, 2026, ahead of the first South Korea-Central Asia summit. South Korea is preparing to welcome the leaders of the five Central Asian nations for the first presidential summit between Seoul and the region.

Wednesday's summit, preceded by bilateral discussions between South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and the leaders of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, seeks to deepen economic cooperation and establish a permanent framework for engagement.

“The first expectation is political. The summit will raise a dialogue that has existed since 2007 to the level of heads of state,” Sanat Kushkumbayev, from the Kazakhstan Institute for Strategic Studies, told Al Jazeera. Central Asian states are increasingly organizing as the C5+ bloc to seek investments, technology access, and diversified partnerships beyond Moscow and Beijing, while South Korea aims to reduce its supply-chain dependencies on China.

Sabina Insebayeva, a political scientist at Nazarbayev University, noted that South Korea's K-Silk Road initiative launched in 2024 goes beyond raw material extraction to develop processing and manufacturing capabilities locally. By the end of 2025, South Korea's direct investment in Central Asia reached approximately $6.4bn.

Beyond economics, historical and cultural ties run deep. Following the 1937 forced relocation of over 170,000 Soviet Koreans by Joseph Stalin to Soviet Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, deportees and their descendants, known as Koryo-saram, maintained their connections to Korean culture. Over the decades, South Korea's cultural influence expanded through language centers, K-pop, and television dramas, supported by educational programs and festivals in places like Astana.

Today, South Korea also offers appealing employment and educational opportunities for Central Asian workers and students, presenting itself as a stable and supportive partner in a region actively diversifying its international relations.