SEOUL, September 09 (AJP) - South Korean media executives joined more than 400 delegates at a Chinese government-organized media forum in Shenzhen on Sept. 5, two months before the city hosts this year's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders' meeting.
The Asia-Pacific Media Forum drew representatives from over 40 countries and regions, along with United Nations agencies and other international bodies. It was co-hosted by the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, the Xinhua News Agency and the Guangdong provincial government, and organized by the Shenzhen city government.
China holds the rotating chair of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) this year, taking it over from South Korea, which hosted the 2025 summit in Gyeongju. Xinhua has reported that roughly 300 APEC-related meetings and events will be held in Chinese cities over the course of the year.
Kwak Young-kil, chairman of Aju Media Group, which publishes AJP, sat on a panel titled "Why did APEC choose Shenzhen?" He was joined by Wang Wen, executive dean of the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University of China, Tan Kar Hing, a Malaysian member of parliament who chairs the Centre of Regional Strategic Studies, and Alexei Ulazov, who handles international cooperation at Russia's National Media Group. The panel discussed Shenzhen's competitiveness and the substance of cooperation under APEC.
Kwak gave a series of interviews in Chinese during the forum to China Central Television, Guangzhou Daily, Shenzhen Special Zone Daily and Shenzhen Television.
"Shenzhen is a city of reform, opening and inclusiveness, China's Silicon Valley and Asia's Silicon Valley," he said, describing changes he had observed in the city and across the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. He also said he expected results from the summit and from further cooperation between South Korea and China.
Wang Haina, chief editor of the group's Chinese-language edition, spoke to Guangzhou Television, Shenzhen Television and Foshan Television about Chinese manufacturing, trade between the two countries and exchange among APEC economies.
Delegates spent the three days before the opening touring Guangzhou, Foshan, Dongguan, Zhuhai and Zhongshan, visiting technology companies and holding four sub-forums across the province.
Li Shulei, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and head of its Publicity Department, delivered the keynote address at the opening ceremony. Huang Kunming, a CPC Political Bureau member who serves as party secretary of Guangdong, also spoke.
The ceremony produced a document the organizers called the Shenzhen Consensus, which described APEC as the most influential economic cooperation mechanism in the region. Sixteen founding organizations from China and abroad formed an organizing committee for a new Asia-Pacific Media Partnership Program. The South China Morning Post reported that the founders include the People's Daily, Xinhua News Agency, Russia's TASS and the Vietnam News Agency.
China will host the 33rd APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting in Shenzhen in November, the third time it has hosted the summit after Shanghai in 2001 and Beijing in 2014.
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