US President Barack Obama, South Korea's Park Seek to Reaffirm Close Ties

Washington: US President Barack Obama was set to welcome his South Korean counterpart to the White House on Friday, hoping to cement close ties amid Seoul's overtures to China.

Officials say Obama and Park Geun-hye will stress cooperation on a range of global issues from health to cyber security, as well as collaboration on an unmanned mission to the moon.

It is a purposeful show of unity, as both countries navigate shifting power balances in northeast Asia.

Now at the mid-point of her five-year term, Park has tried to carve out a bigger diplomatic role for South Korea, notably growing closer to US rival China.

Park and Chinese President Xi Jinping have met six times -- most recently last month when she was the most prominent leader of a US-allied nation to attend China's giant World War II anniversary military parade.

But Obama and Park are eager to stress that the US-South Korea alliance, forged from the embers of World War II, remains vital for both countries.

On the eve of the White House meeting, Park sought to allay US fears about poor relations with another of Washington's allies -- Japan.

Park told a Washington audience she was ready to hold a first formal meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, following a string over disagreements over the legacy of World War II.

That will be welcomed by Obama, along with Park's signaled willingness to eventually join a US-led trans-Pacific free-trade deal.

While links between Seoul and Washington will be foremost on the agenda, continued tensions with North Korea will also be discussed.

"The two leaders will reaffirm their close coordination against the North, discuss ways to deal with the North's tactical provocations and to resume a meaningful dialogue on denuclearization," said a senior South Korean official.

With existing nuclear talks all but dead, Park is under domestic pressure to resolve a crisis that for decades has cast a terrifying pall over South Korea's spectacular economic emergence.

She will likely press Obama to back her Northeast Asia Peace and Cooperation Initiative -- a forum that would include North and South Korea, the United States, Japan, China, Russia and Mongolia.

The initiative is seen by Seoul as a way to bolster regional cooperation and keep much-constricted diplomatic channels open with its bellicose nuclear-armed neighbor in Pyongyang.

Senior South Korean officials privately acknowledge a decade of US-led stop-start "six party" talks to dismantle North Korea's nuclear program are all but dead.

The sixth and perhaps final round of talks ended in 2008, when North Korea fired a Taepodong-2 ballistic missile.

But it remains to be seen if Park can translate ever-closer relations with China into vital backing from Pyongyang's biggest benefactor, or overcome skepticism in Washington about whether the initiative can work.

Obama has little over a year left in office, and a fresh US push on North Korea is seen as unlikely.

Meanwhile "North Korea may be willing to just wait out Obama," admitted another senior South Korean official.