Tokyo Regrets Seoul's Plan to Reopen WTO Complaint Over Japan Export Restrictions, Reports Say

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi held a phone conversation on Wednesday with his South Korean counterpart, Kang Kyung-wha and expressed disappointment over Seoul's intention to once again send a complaint to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) regarding Japan's export barriers in trade with South Korea, media reported.

According to the NHK broadcaster, Motegi told his South Korean counterpart that Seoul's unilateral announcement would not help resolve the issue.

The ministers also discussed the 2018 South Korean court rulings requiring Japan's Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. to compensate four South Korean nationals for using forced labour during the Second World War.

The decision caused an outcry in Japan, which claimed that the 1965 agreement between the two countries had resolved the issue of damages once and for all.

On Tuesday, Na Seung-sik, an official of the South Korean Trade, Industry and Energy Ministry, announced plans to resume the complaint with the WTO regarding the trade row, which began in 2019 when Japan banned the shipping of crucial materials for the high-tech industry to South Korea.

In July 2019, Tokyo cancelled preferential treatment for the export of fluorinated polyimides, photoresist and hydrogen fluoride to South Korea, dealing a serious blow to the nation's high-tech industries, followed by the 2 August decision to stop treating Seoul as a trusted trade partner, adding stricter customs procedures for a total of 1,194 items exported to South Korea.