(Photo provided to Xinhua Daily)

A series of activities organized under the China-South Korea Year of Cultural Exchanges program opened in Yangzhou City on November 3 as this year marks the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

At the opening ceremony, Yangzhou and Gunsan City of South Korea signed a memorandum of cooperation and pledged to deepen their partnership in various fields and enhance their traditional friendship.

Yangzhou is a city recognized in the Culture City of East Asia program and an important part of the Belt and Road Initiative. The city also enjoys a long connection with South Korea. In the Tang Dynasty (618-907), the Korean scholar Choe Chiwon, also a poet who wrote poetry in Chinese, once lived in Yangzhou for several years. Today, Yangzhou has entered into sister-city and friendly relations with six cities of South Korea.

So far, nearly 30 South Korean-invested enterprises have settled in Yangzhou, and the cooperation ranged from pharmaceutical manufacturing to electronic equipment, chemical products, textiles and garments. In 2021, the trade volume between Yangzhou and South Korea exceeded 4.5 billion yuan, the highest growth among Yangzhou's major trade partners.