Ministry of Foreign Affairs Holds “High-level symposium on Korea’s leadership on global health in the COVID-19 era and beyond”

1. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea and the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria co-hosted a “High-level symposium on Korea’s leadership on global health in the COVID-19 era and beyond” on March 31.  o The high-level symposium brought together the Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Choi Jong-moon, 8th UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and Executive Director of the Global Fund Peter Sands, as well as participants of governments, international organizations, academia, companies and civil society from Korea and abroad. The participants reflected on the efforts of the international community to combat COVID-19 last year, and discussed Korea’s role in global health in the post-COVID-19 era. 2. In his opening remarks, Vice Minister Choi called for greater solidarity to end the pandemic, and explained Korea’s proactive efforts to address COVID-19,  such as providing health assistance to over 120 countries, launching “friends groups” to mainstream pandemic-related concerns across the UN, and providing financial contributions to multilateral initiatives like the ACT-A. o The Vice Minister stressed that, even in this pandemic situation, we should not lose sight of our common fight against other global health threats, especially HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. He also highlighted the importance of strengthening global health security to prevent future pandemics. 3. The 8th UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stressed the necessity of strengthening multilateralism for global health security in the face of an unprecedented health crisis, while recalling his days at the UN when he had been a strong advocate to support the efforts of the Global Fund. ​ o He also emphasized that Korea must exercise its global leadership in the fields of health and climate change by sharing best practices of COVID-19 response, offering development assistance, advocating for equitable distribution of vaccines and interlinking COVID-19 recoveries to climate actions. 4. Executive Director of the Global Fund Peter Sands called for further support from the G7 and G20 in global health to ensure equitable access to all pandemic response tools including vaccines, and to continue the fight against HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. 5. Participants appreciated Korea’s exemplary role in responding to COVID-19, which was based on effective pandemic response policy, public participation and innovative technologies. They also commended Korea for its contributions to multilateral initiatives, such as the ACT-A, and then expressed expectations over Korea’s role in advancing global health security in the future. 6. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will continue to actively participate in global efforts to combat COVID-19 and reinforce the global health system. The Ministry also plans to increase its contributions to fighting existing epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria through its partnership with the Global Fund, which celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. Source