Busan, South Korea's second-largest city, won the right to host the 13th Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit on Monday.

Busan beat off stiff competition from South Korea's capital city of Seoul and the resort island of Jeju for the summit of 21 Asia-Pacific members scheduled for Nov. 20-21, 2005, reported South Korean Yonhap News Agency.

"We tried to select a city that can stage the conference in a successful, productive and exemplary manner," said former Prime Minister Lee Hong-koo, chairman of a government-civilian panel formed in last November to select the host city.

Lee spoke at the end of a meeting of the 19-member selection committee held at the South Korean Foreign Ministry headquarters in downtown Seoul on Monday.

South Korean Prime Minister Goh Kun will preside over a meetingof the APEC preparatory committee on Tuesday to finalize Busan as the host city, said Yonhap.

South Korea was named the host for next year's APEC meeting at the 8th APEC summit meeting in Brunei in year of 2000.

Source: Xinhua