SEOUL -- Prime Minister Kim Min-seok vowed Monday to support the global expansion of defense companies by helping adopt the latest technologies and easing regulations.
Kim made the remark during a breakfast forum with defense industry leaders at the National Assembly, saying the nation has transformed itself over 50 years from a country that could not make a single rifle to an arms powerhouse exporting missiles, fighter jets and submarines.
"The entire world wants to work together with the K-defense industry," he said. "From the perspective of making clear that cooperation with the K-defense industry is cooperation with the Republic of Korea as a whole, we will support the global expansion of defense companies."
Kim recalled that while accompanying Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney to a Hanwha Ocean shipyard in the southern city of Geoje in October, he told Carney that he was engaging not with a single company but with the whole country of South Korea.
"We plan to create a win-win ecosystem," he said of the government's plans for the defense industry, citing its preemptive adoption of artificial intelligence, unmanned robots and other cutting-edge technologies, and its plans to drastically shorten procedures through deregulation.
