• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.17 no.7
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• pp.487-497
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• 2017

South Korea needs reorganization of dispute resolution system due to the frequent occurrence of a case that trade secret or technique are leaked. First, the distributed various laws are established and enforced by enacting and enforcing individual laws. Therefore, the redundancy problems, the collision of individual laws, the decline in diversity, integrity, and connectivity are issues. An independent legal system is needed by Act on the Prevention and Protection of Technology Leakage. Thereby, The support system of technological protection that is sprayed in government departments such as the Small and Medium Business Administration, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, the Patent Office, the Fair Trade Commission, the Trade Committee, the National Police Agency, and the Spy Agency integrates and unifies institutionally, and it is necessary to advance a policy with functional division. Second, the Patent Tribunal, the Invention Promotion Act, the Industrial Property Right Dispute Mediation Committee by the patent law, the Industrial Technical Dispute Mediation Committee on the Industrial Technology Outflow Prevention and Protection Law and the Medium and Small Firm Dispute Mediation and Arbitration Committee on Small Business Technology Protection Support Law are installed. However, since it established the integrated law on the Act on the Prevention and Protection of Technology Leakage, it is desirable to set the merged operation of establishment on the Technical Dispute Mediation Committee under the Small and Medium Business Administration or the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.91-120
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• 2020

The Scope of Application of North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act and Foreign Investment Act This article examines whether the Foreign Economic Arbitration Act and the Foreign Investment Act of North Korea apply to South Korean parties or companies. This article analyzes laws and agreements related to economic cooperation between South Korea and North Korea. Furthermore, this article compares and evaluates laws related to foreign investment and enacted in North Korea. Now, North Korea's door is closed due to economic sanctions against it, but it will be opened soon. Thus, this article prepares for the future opening of North Korea's markets. Is there a rule of laws in North Korea or just a ruler? Are there laws in North Korea? North Korea has enacted a number of legislation to attract foreign investors, referring to those Chinese laws. For example, North Korea enacted the Foreigner Investment Act, the Foreigner Company Act, the Foreign Investment Bank Act, the Foreign Economic Arbitration Act, the Foreign Economic Contract Act, the International Trade Act, and the Free Economy and Trade Zone Act, among others. Article 2 (2) of the Foreign Investment Law of North Korea states, "Foreign investors are corporations and individuals from other countries investing in our country." It is interpreted that South Korea is not included in the "other countries" of this definition. According to many mutual agreements signed by South Korea and North Korea, the relationship between the two Koreas is a special relation inside the Korean ethnic group. An arbitration between a South Korean party and a North Korean party has the characteristics of both domestic arbitrations and international arbitrations. If the South Korea and North Korea Commercial Arbitration Commission or the Kaesong Industrial Complex Arbitration Commission is not established, the possibility of arbitration by the Chosun International Trade Arbitration Commission, established under North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act, should be examined. There have been no cases where the Foreign Economic Arbitration Act is applied to disputes between parties of South Korea and North Korea. It might be possible to apply the Foreign Economic Arbitration Act by recognizing the "foreign factor" of a dispute between the South Korean party and North Korean party. It is necessary to raise legislative clarifications by revising the North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act as to whether Korean parties or companies are included in the scope of this Act's application. Even if it is interpreted that South Korean parties or companies are not included in the scope of North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act, disputes between South Korean companies and North Korean companies can be resolved by foreign arbitration institutes such as CIETAC in China, HKIAC in Hong Kong, or SIAC in Singapore. Such arbitration awards could be enforced in North Korea pursuant to Article 64 of North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act. This is because the arbitration awards of foreign arbitration institutes are included in the scope of North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act. The matter is how to enforce the North Korean laws when a North Korean party or North Korean government does not abide by the laws or their contracts. It is essential for North Korea to join the New York Convention (Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards) and the ICSID Convention (Convention on the Settlement of Investment Disputes Between States and Nationals of Other States).

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.44 no.6
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• pp.231-246
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• 2019

Circumvention refers to the situation in which exporters try to circumvent import restrictions by setting up factories in third countries and assembling and producing parts locally. Circumvention dumping eliminates the impacts of existing anti-dumping measures, and major countries are introducing anti-circumvention dumping laws to address this problem. If the act of the exporting country is recognized as a circumvention dumping activity, anti-dumping duties are applied retroactively to the imported goods or components. Evasion is an act of importation that results in the reduction or non-application of cash deposits, securities, or anti-dumping or countervailing duties, in a manner that is substantive or false, substantive or omission. In this article, we reviewed the contents and examples of the anti-circumvention measures by the US Department of Commerce (DOC), the International Trade Commission (ITC), and the Anti-Evasion measures by the CBP. The CBP examples show how much inference can be made about which parts of the CBP's investigations, and in what ways. The enactment of the EAPA created an environment in which the role of the CBP was directly guaranteed, and it was possible to apply adverse inferences to those who did not respond to requests for information, resulting in stronger CBP's authority. Therefore, it is advisable for Korea to examine the introduction of domestic laws, such as the bypass anti-dumping system, in order to cope with unfair trade practices that undermine and neutralize the effects of anti-dumping measures.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.75
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• pp.117-136
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• 2017

Trade finance services have been played an important role in the Korea trade development history since 1960's. These days the trade environment is confronted by the 4th Industrial revolution and new trade protectionism. So we need to improve the Korea Trade Finance Services in order to improve Korea trade volume. Bank of Korea(BOK) also revised the Rule of Korea Trade Finance in 2014 and enlarged the trade fund for commercial banks where they handle the trade finance to small and medium enterprises(SME) in 2016. This article handle the current state and problems of Korea trade finance services and suggest the improvement measures as follows; First, the commercial banks, which handle trade finance fund, should improve the customs and practice of judge loan for SMEs. Second, the export volume counting rule for trade loan should harmonize between BOK's Rule and Foreign Trade Management Regulation under the Foreign Trade Act. Third, the processing trade and intermediate trade also can use the trade finance like other trade. Fourth, Trade finance should be in balance between export and import finance to defend the new protectionism. It means that the trade finance should expand to import in the certain conditions. Lastly, the related trade promotion agencies and their employees should improve their skills and abilities for handling trade finance.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.157-181
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• 2007

The commercial relationship between South and North Korea is defined under the concept of economic relation and cooperation. To resolve any dispute that can arise from the trade and investment relations between South and North Korea, 'Agreement on the Procedures to Resolve Commercial Arbitration of South-North Korea' came into force in August 2003. Commercial Arbitration Committee of South-North Korea will be organized as the member lists of the committee were exchanged in July 2006 between South and North Korea. This committee must become a central system to settle the trade and investment disputes between South and North Korea. North Korea's Foreign Economic Arbitration Act was enacted to provide the foreign investors with the safe measures in their investments such as dispute resolution. But this Act can not dispute the trade and investment disputes between South and North Korea. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the activation of arbitration between South and North Korea by studying Commercial Arbitration Committee of South-North Korea introduced by Agreement on the Procedures to Resolve Commercial Arbitration of South-North Korea and Agreement on the Construction and Operation of Commercial Arbitration Committee of South-North Korea and finding the problems and solutions of Commercial Arbitration Committee of South-North Korea.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.233-257
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• 2009

The 21st century is witnessing the explosive increase in the usage of internet and international electronic transactions. Due to the unique characteristics of the electronic information, substantial part of such transaction can and do take the form of cross-border transactions. However, there have not been settled appropriate set of rules applicable to the international electronic transactions. Currently, in respect to e-L/C transactions in international trade, there are laws such as Electronic Transaction Basic Act in our country, E-Trade Promotion Act, E-Signature Law, Act on Promotion of Information and Communication Network Utilization and Information Protection and Marine Charter 5 in the Commercial Law. Nevertheless, a complete legislation, that is a uniform rule for e L/C which could support e L/C transactions fully hasn't been established yet. Accordingly, those laws concerned need to improve to regulate e-L/C transactions. The purpose of this paper is to look into the national status for law readjustment to prepare for a new electronic environment and to use appropriately the e-L/C issued by electronic means, and to conduct a comparative analysis on the related regulations to introduce a pertinent laws and propose related regulations to contribute to the making of effective laws to regulate e-L/C.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.26 no.7
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• pp.93-108
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• 2022

Purpose - This paper examines the admissibility of restitution as the legal consequence where a contract is frustrated under the Law of Reform (Frustrated Contracts) Act 1943 in comparison with Korean Civil Code (KCC). In order to provide practical guidelines and advice regarding choice of and application of law for contracting parties in international trade, the paper comparatively evaluates requirements and the scope of restitution under the Act 1943 and KCC. Design/methodology - This paper executes a comparative study to analyze whether the parties may claim restitution of money paid or non-money benefit obtained before or after the time of discharge under English law and KCC. To achieve the purpose, it focuses on the identifying characteristics of each statute, thereby providing guidelines to overcome difficulties in legal application and interpretation as to restitution as the consequence of frustration. Findings - Under English law, the benefit may be restituted according to Art 1943 or the common law rule, mistake of fact or law. Under the KCC, restitution is considered based on the principle of the obligation to recover the original obtained regardless of the time when the benefit is conferred. Whilst Act 1943 does not require careful analysis of the grounds of restitution, requirements to justify restitution according to the principle of unjust enrichment, mistake of fact or law, and the KCC should be met. Meanwhile, the KCC may provide more opportunities to award restitution because it does not require the burden of proof related to the defendant's good faith, unlike the principle of unjust enrichment. Originality/value - Where the contract is frustrated by the effect of COVID-19, one legal issue is a consequence of frustration. Therefore, this paper analyzes requirements and the scope of restitution under English law as compared with the KCC in a timely manner. It provides contracting parties with practical guidelines and advice to reduce unpredictability when they choose the governing law in a contract.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.53-85
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• 2022

Small and medium-sized enterprises ("SMEs") are vulnerable to trade secret misappropriation. Korea's legislation for the protection of SMEs' trade secrets and provision of civil, criminal, and administrative remedies includes the SME Technology Protection Act, the Unfair Competition Prevention Act, the Industrial Technology Protection Act, the Mutually Beneficial Cooperation Act, and the Subcontracting Act. Among these acts, the revised SME Technology Protection Act of 2018 introduced the "administrative technology misappropriation investigation system" to facilitate a rapid resolution of SMEs' technology misappropriation disputes. On September 27, 2021, Korea's Ministry of SMEs announced that it had reached an agreement to resolve the dispute between Hyundai Heavy Industries and Samyeong Machinery through the administrative technology misappropriation investigation system. However, not until 3 years and a few months passed since the introduction of the system could it be used to resolve an SME's technology misappropriation dispute with a large corporation. So there arose a question on the usefulness of the system. Therefore, we conducted a comparative legal analysis of Korea's laws enacted to protect trade secrets of SMEs and to address technology misappropriation, focusing on their legislative purpose, protected subject matter, types of misappropriation, and legal remedies. Then we analyzed the administrative technology misappropriation investigation system and the cases where this system was applied. We developed a proposal to enhance the usefulness of the system. The expert interviews of 4 attorneys who are experienced in the management of the system to check the practical value of the proposal. Our analysis shows that the lack of compulsory investigation and criminal sanctions is the fundamental limitation of the system. We propose revising the SME Technology Protection Act to provide correction orders, criminal sanctions, and compulsory investigation. We also propose training professional workforces to conduct digital forensics, enabling terminated SMEs to utilize the system, and assuring independence and fairness of the mediation and arbitration of the technology misappropriation disputes.

• Journal of Navigation and Port Research
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.151-157
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• 2007

After World Trade Center's Terror in 2001 and promulgating Maritime Transportation Security Act (MTSA, 2002) and Security and Accountability For Every Port Act (SAFE Port Act, 2006) in the United States, most of the attention on security of international transportation including marine carrier and facility has focused increasingly. Inspection stations in foreign seaport terminal including Busan, South Korea, have been installed by Container Security Initiative (CSI) and Customs Trade Partnership against Terrorism (C-TPAT). The inspection station, however, may directly and indirectly affect delay of truck turnaround time in the seaport, especially high and severe level of security. This paper was analysed a risk for the additional average delay of truck turnaround time incurring by the inspection station under the all level of security, C-TPAT and CSI. As a result of this risk analysis, the higher weighted inspection time based on raising security level, the less number of trucks to be inspected, which will derive high delay in the inspection station.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.49-59
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• 2016

The study attempts to investigate the causes of Sino-U.S. trade friction in recent years and provides countermeasures accordingly. The import and export volume of two countries, the product structure of China's export, the 337th Act lawsuits related to China, the industries involved in trade friction, and the G-L Index of Sino-U.S. Products are analyzed in detail. The causes of Sino-US trade frictions are discussed from the aspect of mercantilism and trade protectionism, interest groups and governments' trade policies, Chinese product structure, intellectual property protection in China, and performance of Chinese enterprises in litigation. Based on these, countermeasures are put forward. China needs to implement industrial upgrading, increasing the added value of products, and improving intellectual property protection. A trade friction warning system also needs to be constructed. The Chinese government needs to carry out strategic dialogue and international negotiation.