South Korea's Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy has announced that it will further restrict technology and industrial exports to Russia and its ally Belarus to support the U.S.-led pressure campaign against Moscow over the war in Ukraine. After years of friction, Seoul and Tokyo are working to repair relations as they tighten their three-way security cooperation with Washington to counter the threat posed by North Korea. In September 2019, South Korea dropped Japan from its "whitelist" of countries receiving fast-track approvals in trade, reacting to a similar move by Tokyo. South Korea accused Tokyo of weaponizing trade to retaliate against South Korean court rulings that ordered Japanese companies to offer reparations to South Koreans forced into slave labor before the end of World War II. The 2018 rulings irked Japan, which insists all compensation issues were settled by a 1965 treaty. Relations between the U.S. allies began to thaw in March when South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol announced plans to use South Korean funds to compensate the forced laborers without requiring Japanese contributions.
Following the Yoon-Kishida summit, South Korea withdrew its complaint at the WTO against Japan as Tokyo simultaneously confirmed its removal of export controls over a set of chemicals seen as vital to South Korea’s technology industry. With Japan’s status restored, South Korea now provides preferential treatment to 29 countries over exports of sensitive “strategic” materials that can be used for both civilian and military purposes.