Korean media: White House publicly released a photo of the South Korean negotiation team, smiling and giving a thumbs-up

"Fact Sheet" released before South Korea and the U.S. still need to coordinate differences... Victor Cha: Met with Lee Jae-myung, Trump will not just congratulate

On July 31, the White House announced that it had reached "another historic trade agreement" with South Korea, and publicly released a photo of President Donald Trump with the South Korean negotiation team through its social media account. The White House reiterated that South Korea would invest 35 billion U.S. dollars (about 488.6 billion won) in the United States, and commit to purchasing 100 billion U.S. dollars worth of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and other energy products, and stated, "South Korea has decided not to impose any tariffs on American products, perfectly opening up trade." On August 1, two days before the deadline for the reciprocal tariff exemption proposed by Trump, South Korea dramatically reached the aforementioned agreement, but there are still tasks to narrow down differences in detail before the release of the fact sheet.

From the group photo released by the White House that day, Trump, wearing a blue tie, stood in the middle, smiling and raising his right thumb. U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and USTR Representative Jamie S. Grier attended. On the South Korean side were Kim Yun-chul, the economic vice minister and minister of planning and finance, Yeo Han-gyu, the director of the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy's Office of International Trade Negotiations, and Choi Ji-young, the assistant to the international economic management officer of the Ministry of Planning and Finance, who were present. The photo was taken in the West Wing Cabinet Room, where Trump usually presides over cabinet meetings. Behind them hung paintings of former presidents Abraham Lincoln and General Ulysses S. Grant meeting. The South Korean negotiation team had an approximately 40-minute face-to-face meeting with Trump, and as soon as the team left the White House, Trump published the agreement message on his self-created social media "Truth Social."

Through this agreement, South Korea temporarily passed the test in Trump's "tariff war," but due to differing statements between South Korea and the U.S., narrowing the gap in details will become an important issue next. That is, before the White House releases the official document named "Fact Sheet," there may be continued friction in the wording of the document. For example, Trump said that the 3.5 billion U.S. dollar investment decided by South Korea "will be selected by me," how this sentence is described in the document is being closely watched. In the document signed by the U.S. and Japan, the description used was "Under the Trump’s direction." Trump said that the additional investment amount outside of LNG will be determined in the bilateral talks with President Lee Jae-myung, so the amount of South Korean investment in the U.S. is likely to be higher than now. Regarding the open agricultural products, which are a major point of contention between South Korea and the U.S., Trump claimed "complete openness," while Kim Yun-chul said, "an agreement has been reached, and the market will not be further opened." Although South Korea has protected the rice and beef markets, if the U.S. requests a relaxation of the inspection standards for American agricultural products in the future, the South Korean agriculture sector is bound to face some opposition.

In this agreement process, the role of South Korean companies was significant, especially Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong, Hyundai Motor Chairman Chung Eui-sun, and Hanwha Group Vice President Kim Dong-gwan flew directly to Washington D.C., led high-level meetings between South Korea and the U.S., and provided assistance for investment plans in the U.S. With the efforts of the company executives, the negotiations that had previously stalled were able to break through. Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Kim Jung-won joined the negotiations with the U.S. only three days after taking office. At a press conference on the 30th, when asked about the specific roles of the company executives, he replied, "This part is not suitable for discussion." In this situation, the Lee Jae-myung government and the ruling party are pushing forward various legislation, adding burdens to South Korean companies that should be focusing on investments in the U.S. Among recent economic ministers, Kim Yun-chul is rare in supporting an increase in corporate tax. On the same day he announced the results of the South Korea-U.S. negotiations, Samsung Electronics released its quarterly report stating that operating profit was halved. To this, Kim Geon, a member of the People Power Party who once served as head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' Korean Peninsula Peace Negotiation Division, said, "It's fortunate that the agreement was reached at the last minute before the exemption period," "but the devil is usually in the details of the negotiations, and it's too early to boast now."

On the same day, Victor Cha, the chief of Korea at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), commented, "Although South Korea claims that no concessions were made on both rice and beef issues, Trump wrote that South Korea has promised to purchase more agricultural products from the U.S.," "Additionally, it remains unknown whether South Korea has promised to revoke the import ban on beef over 30 months old." Regarding the upcoming South Korea-U.S. summit, he said, "Trump will not just congratulate on the trade agreement during the summit," "he may discuss investment, non-tariff barriers, currency manipulation, and other issues related to trade." Wendy Cutler, former Deputy USTR and Deputy Director of the Asia Society Policy Institute (ASPI), said, "South Korea did not secure lower tariff rates in the two priority areas of steel and chips," "this agreement has rendered the South Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (FTA), which allows mutual cancellation of almost all reciprocal tariffs, less valuable. South Korea is an FTA partner, but it's regrettable that it seems to have received no special treatment."

Source: Chosun Ilbo

Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1839310938919936/

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