USTR proposes new 12.5% tariffs on Korea, 53 others for failing to prevent imports made with forced labor

Korean exports could face an additional U.S. tariff of more than 12 percent after the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) moved Tuesday to impose levies on goods from 60 economies it says are failing to keep products made with forced labor out of American markets.

The USTR  in an investigative report determined that 54 economies — including Korea, China, Japan, Britain, Australia and Taiwan — "failed to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor," citing that they lack sufficient laws, institutions and enforcement mechanisms to prevent the import of goods made with forced labor. It proposed imposing an additional 12.5 percent tariff on those economies. 

Six others — Canada, the European Union, Mexico, Indonesia, Pakistan and Ecuador — "failed to effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor," it said, and proposed additional tariffs of 10 percent.

Forced labor refers to situations in which workers are unable to freely leave their jobs or are coerced into work through violence, threats or debt. The United States has increasingly treated forced labor in global supply chains as a major trade issue, most notably in connection with the use of Uyghur labor in China's Xinjiang region.

USTR said countries with inadequate bans on forced labor imports "undermine the universal aim of eliminating forced labor, permit firms that avail themselves of forced labor to produce goods at lower cost and thereby distort market conditions for firms that do not use forced labor." 

“The failure of our most important trading partners to address the importation of goods made with forced labor is unacceptable. This creates a dynamic where American workers are forced to compete globally on an unlevel playing field,”  USTR Representative Jamieson Greer said. “We will no longer tolerate this disparity."

The move comes roughly three months after the USTR launched a Section 301 investigation into 60 economies over forced labor imports on March 12. Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act allows the U.S. government to impose tariffs or other trade restrictions when foreign governments engage in unfair, unreasonable or discriminatory trade practices that burden U.S. commerce.

The USTR said it will accept applications to participate in a public hearing until June 22 and written comments until July 6. A public hearing is scheduled for July 7, after which a final decision on tariffs will be made.

The Korean presidential office responded to the report results on Wednesday.

"The government will actively engage in the comment submission process and public hearing scheduled for July, and will take comprehensive stock of the ongoing Section 301 overproduction investigation and other related matters," a Blue House official said. "We will do our utmost to ensure that the balance of benefits under the existing Korea-U.S. tariff agreement is not undermined."

The two countries struck a tariff deal in 2025 under which Washington cut its tariffs on Korean goods from 25 percent to 15 percent in exchange for a Korean pledge to invest $350 billion in the U.S. The original 25 percent rate had been set under the Trump administration's "reciprocal" tariff policy, which imposed levies on countries it accused of charging unfair rates on American exports.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.

BY HAN JEE-HYE, OH HYUN-SEOK [lee.jian@joongang.co.kr]