President Moon due to name special envoys to U.S. China, Japan, Russia

문 대통령, 미중일러에 특사 파견 방침 We start with the latest moves by the new Moon Jae-in administration... After several months of political vacuum ,... South Korea is facing a slew of diplomatic issues of great importance. Given the scale of the tasks at hand,... President Moon is soon expected to send teams of special envoys to key regional powers. Connie Kim leads us off. President Moon Jae-in is soon expected to name his special envoys to four countries of strategic importance to South Korea. Those nations are the United States, China, Japan and Russia. President Moon has reportedly tapped former media mogul Hong Seok-hyun as the special envoy to the U.S... lawmaker Park Byeong-seug of the ruling Democratic Party as the special envoy to China... Moon hee-sang and Song Young-gil , also of the ruling party, as special envoys to Japan and Russia respectively. The special envoys are expected to discuss bilateral issues with the respective countries, and arrange details of possible future summit meetings. South Korean officials say that, after receiving an official invitation for the "One Belt, One Road" forum in Beijing," Park Byeong-seug , along with other ruling party lawmakers with intimate knowledge of China will be heading to the Chinese capital on Saturday. China had not sent an invite to Seoul due to its strong opposition to the U.S. missile defense system THAAD being deployed to the Korean peninsula. However,... Beijing had a sudden change of heart following Moon Jae-in's election victory,... possibly hoping to change Seoul's decision over the THAAD deployment. with Hong expected to lead a delegation to Washington,.. the U.S. has also reportedly launched preparations to send its officials to Seoul. On past occasions, the U.S. Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs has led a delegation to South Korea to meet the President-elect. However, considering that seat is vacant,.. it's most likely that Matt Pottinger, senior director for Asian affairs at the National Security Council, will lead the delegation to discuss the details of a planned summit between presidents Moon and Trump. The two leaders agreed on the need to hold a summit as soon as possible during their first phone call this week. When they get together, they will most likely discuss their North Korea policies and their bilateral trade pact that President Trump has vowed to renegotiate or terminate. Connie Kim, Arirang News.