South Korea has appointed Park Jung-sung as its new chief trade negotiator, with the minister vowing to manage mounting risks in the country's trade relationship with Washington amid sweeping shifts in the global economic order. In his inaugural address, Park identified US tariff restructuring and Washington's push to reshore strategic industries as permanent features of an intensifying US-China rivalry, and said implementing joint investment projects with the United States had become both the greatest challenge and opportunity in bilateral ties. South Korea committed $350 billion in US investment last year as part of a trade arrangement with Washington, and Park said his priority is to build a new cooperation framework around that commitment — on a par with the existing free trade agreement between the two allies — while strengthening Seoul's position in critical sectors such as semiconductors, nuclear power and shipbuilding.