(Photo : President Lee Myung-bak (left) meets Uzbekistan leader Islam Karimov after Lee arrived

in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, on Sunday (May 10). )

President Lee Myung-bak left Korea for Uzbekistan Sunday (May 10) as part of his state visits to two Central Asian countries – Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

After his arrival in Tashkent on Sunday, President Lee met with Korean residents of Uzbekistan. At the meeting with Korean residents, President Lee stressed the importance of ties between the two countries and vowed to increase support for Uzbekistan and Koreans living there.

President Lee will have a summit meeting with his Uzbek counterpart Monday to discuss ways to enhance business cooperation between the two countries, such as joint development of the Surgil gas fields and the Navoi Airport modernization project.

Lee will also have meetings with Uzbek business leaders, politicians and youth representatives, lay flowers at the Uzbek Monument of Independence, and visit Samarkand, an ancient city on the old Silk Road linking China and the Middle East to Europe, before leaving for Astana, Kazakhstan, on Tuesday.

In Kazakhstan, President Lee will have dinner with Kazakh business people to discuss ways to boost business cooperation projects between the two countries.

Lee will also have summit talks with Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev to discuss energy resource cooperation projects such as the Balkhash coal power plant, Zhambyl mining area and other bilateral issues.

President Lee will then attend the Korea-Kazakhstan business forum to deliver a speech, visit a monument to Kazakh patriots to lay flowers and have meetings with the leaders of ethnic Korean communities and Koreans living in Kazakhstan.

The upcoming presidential visit to the two Central Asian nations aims to strengthen cooperation in energy resources between Korea and these two countries, both of which have abundant uranium, iron ore and other mineral deposits, according to Cheong Wa Dae.

It will also help improve the mutual cooperation in solving issues affecting the world, such as the global financial crisis, climate change and the regional and international communities, the presidential office said.

It is all part of President Lee''s “New Asia Diplomacy” initiative, which he suggested earlier this year.

Through the summits, Korea and Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan will come up with concrete plans to provide support for the nearly 300,000 ethnic Koreans living in the region and extend the Korean culture boom, or Hallyu, by strengthening the bilateral cultural exchange network, said Cheong Wa Dae.