President of Russia's Tass visits Seoul to join PyeongChang news-sharing network

SEOUL, June 5 (Yonhap) -- The president of Russia's state-run news agency Tass is visiting Seoul to sign an agreement to join South Korea's Yonhap News Agency's content-sharing platform for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics.

Sergey Mikhaylov arrived in South Korea on Sunday for a three-day visit at the invitation of Yonhap. He is accompanied by two senior officials from the company.

Mikhaylov began the trip early Monday by laying a wreath at the bronze statue of the great Russian poet Alexander Pushkin sitting in front of the Lotte Hotel in the city center.

The statue was erected in November 2013 by the Korea-Russia Dialogue, a nongovernmental organization affiliated with the South Korean foreign ministry, at the request of the Russian Writers' Union to help further relations between the two countries. Russian President Vladimir Putin attended the unveiling ceremony.

"There is a statue of Pushkin in Russia, but this one is the most beautiful of all statues that I have seen," Mikhaylov said. "I feel like Koreans like Pushkin too."

He then visited the Russian Embassy in Seoul and the Seoul National Cemetery, and is scheduled to meet vice ministers of culture and foreign affairs and Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon in the afternoon.

The Tass president will ink an agreement with Park No-hwang, president and CEO of Yonhap News Agency, to join the PyeongChang News Service Network (PNN) at Yonhap's headquarters in central Seoul.

sshim@yna.co.kr
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