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Kobe's Sister Cities

As our world become more interdependent, sister city relationships are becoming more important when it comes to promoting cross-cultural understanding and economic opportunities.  Kobe has seven sister cities and one friendship city:

Sister Cities:
Seattle, WA, USA (1957)
Marseille, France (1961)
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (1969)
Riga, Latvia (1974)
Brisbane, Australia (1985)
Barcelona, Spain (1993)
Incheon, South Korea (2010)

Friendship City:
Tianjin, China (1973)


In addition, Kobe established two sister ports in 1967:

Port of Seattle, USA
Port of Rotterdam, Netherlands


Last but not least, Kobe has some other special relationships and formal friendships:

Tianjin Port (Friendship)
Philadelphia, USA (Partnership City)
Daegu, South Korea (Partnership City)

Did You Know...?

The Kobe Municipal Arboretum has several miniature sister city "forests" in their park.