Government "Strengthening Crackdown on Illegal Exports via Russia"

Expansion of Items Including Construction Heavy Equipment and Secondary Batteries
Increase Expected in Attempts to Evade Export Controls

The government has decided to concentrate its investigative and enforcement capabilities on illegal exports to Russia or rerouted exports to Russia via third countries. This decision comes in response to the recent revision of related notices, which expanded the list of items requiring situational permits to include construction heavy equipment and secondary batteries, leading to an expected increase in attempts to evade export controls through rerouted exports.

The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy announced on the 26th that, following the implementation of the "Strategic Items Export and Import Notice" on the 24th, which expanded the situational permit targets for Russia and Belarus, it plans to strengthen crackdowns and enforcement on illegal exports of items subject to permits in cooperation with related ministries.

Previously, the Ministry revised the "33rd Strategic Items Export and Import Notice" to expand the situational permit targets in order to coordinate export controls against Russia and Belarus with the international community. As a result, 682 items were added to the list of situational permit targets that could be diverted for military use, including construction heavy equipment such as excavators, secondary batteries, machine tools, and aircraft parts.

An official from the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy stated, "So far, related ministries including the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy have detected companies illegally exporting to Russia or rerouting exports to Russia through third countries through close cooperation among export licensing (Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy), external cooperation (Ministry of Foreign Affairs), customs and investigations (Korea Customs Service), and intelligence (National Intelligence Service) authorities, as well as coordination with allied countries," adding, "The number of recent penalties has also been steadily increasing."

According to the Ministry, Company A was determined to be subject to situational permits through the Strategic Items Management Institute but falsely declared 'not subject' in its export report and illegally exported yachts and outboard motors (worth 240 million KRW) to Russia. Additionally, Company B, despite receiving a request from the Ministry to cease transactions with U.S. sanctioned entities, circumvented this by rerouting through a third country and exported semiconductor equipment and parts worth 1.7 billion KRW to Russian sanctioned entities.

The Ministry plans to strengthen export control compliance through cooperation with related agencies. In particular, it will focus investigative and enforcement capabilities on blocking rerouted exports of 50 common core items, including semiconductor parts that can be used in drones, as requested by allied countries, as well as sensitive items such as machine tools.

Alongside this, to prevent unauthorized exports due to lack of awareness of the system, the Ministry will conduct promotional and educational activities targeting export companies related to newly designated permit items through cooperation with the Korea Customs Service and the Strategic Items Management Institute following the notice revision.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.