The interview to the Ambassador of Kyrgyzstan was held at the Embassy of Kyrgyz Republic in Seoul, on December08, 2011. Interviewed by Mr. Kwang Yul Shin, President of ICFW
H.E Duishonkul T Chotonov, Ambassador of Kyrgyzstan
We met Kyrgyzstan's Ambassador in Kyrgyzstan's embassy which is located in Itaewon. He has a gentle appearance like Korean and we knew that he is interested in Korea a lot during talking comfortably.
He has worked in Korea as a Kyrgyzstan's Ambassador for 6 months. Due to the friendly relations between Korea and Kyrgyzstan, he already knew some part of Korea and studied Korean culture before coming here.
Nowadays, the population of Kyrgyzstan is appoximatley 500 millions, among them, about 20000 is Korean 'Go-rye' who live there. Some of them advance into many part as a minister, a lawmaker, a general and so on. Especially Kyrgyzstan's government made a policy for about 80 countries people who want to study Kyrgyzstan's culture and their life style.
The interchange between Korea and Kyrgyzstan has been active since the independence in 1991. About 2000 Korean including global sudents go and come to Kyrgyzstan nowadays.
Especially, there is no distinction between natives and immigrants, so there is 27% of immigrants living there. Moreover, people study Korea in three Kyrgyzstan's universities, in elementary school as well. They are planning to form a culture exchange organization for recognition of each other greeting 20 years of cultural interchange between Korea and Kyrgyzstan.
About 1000 of Kyrgyzstan people work as laborers, about 100 are students and about 300 of them married Korean living here. As you know, they have some problems with cultural dissimilarity and a marriage arranged by a go-between so that he is eager for them to solve these problems. On the other hands, although the marriage problem is a personal matter, he is concern with misunderstanding each other, so tries to eliminate this kind anxiety.
Kyrgyzstan has received a great deal of aid from Korea when they have in trouble like a dreadful disaster. The Ambassador said he will make every effort to develop the interchange of economy, culture with Korea. Particularly he hope that Korean would be concerned about the invest in Kyrgyzstan's large enterprises than small enterprise. Lastly he thanks to Korea's government and Korean via this interview.
