TEHRAN (Iran News) – Former Secretary General of Iran-South Korea Joint Chamber of Commerce says the trade between Iran and South Korea in the past two years has been at the lowest level ever, adding that Korean carmakers are keen to export their products to Iran.
Speaking t ILNA, Pouya Firouzi said that the chamber cannot be an official source for announcing the status of Iran’s frozen fund in South Korea, adding that the government has directly started talks with South Korean government over the fate of the frozen money and the chamber in any condition is just a consumer and listener. He added that ultimately this is the governments who announce the mechanism and the chamber is not allowed or able to confirm or deny unfreezing of the fund.
He then said that the trade relation of Iran and South Korea in the past two years has fallen to the lowest level and last year Iran’s exports to Korea stood at $82m and in return it imported $736m of goods. He added that the trade volume of both country once was $6b and the figure has slumped considerably.
Touching upon the main factors behind this decline, Firouzi said that the main factor was the exit of South Korean companies from Iran after imposition of sanctions and the private sector was unable to have banking transactions with South Korea and it seems the frozen money in South Korea helped this decline to get faster and worse.
He said that policy of importing cars from South Korea is in two parts, adding that weak trade ties with Korea and domestic policies caused banning cars from South Korea and if these two factors change, South Korean companies are interested to have some share from Iran’s car market.
Firouzi added that before the exit of South Korean companies from Iran, they had some discussions with Koreans on imports of goods which were importing technical knowhow, imports of technology and ultimately investment of Korean companies in Iran but unfortunately sanctions stopped them and actually trade between the two countries was halted, adding that South Koreans’ investment in Iran hinges on macro policy-makings of Iran.
He added that he does not know why South Korea does not like to pay Iran’s frozen money in dollar and they want to pay it in its national currency won, adding that he is not aware that the talks between the two countries is in which direction, reiterating that paying money in won is not in the benefit of the country and Koreans will benefit from it.
Last week South Korean media said Seoul and Washington are mulling over ways to release Iran’s $7 billion funds frozen due to U.S. sanctions on Tehran.
In an article on Tuesday, the Korea Economic Daily said the move will help Seoul resume its business ties with Tehran as well as President Joe Biden in the 2024 U.S. presidential election.
Citing diplomatic and government sources in Seoul, the conservative business daily said Korean and U.S. government officials are involved in working-level discussions under Washington’s leadership to unfreeze the Iranian funds.
South Korea has reportedly blocked $7 billion which it owes for importing Iranian oil prior to full imposition of U.S. sanctions in May 2019. Bilateral ties between Iran and South Korea are frayed because of Seoul’s refusal to release the Iranian money held at two commercial banks – Woori Bank and the Industrial Bank of Korea.
