Anchor: South Korea has officially removed Japan from its list of trusted trade partners. The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy said on Wednesday that it revised the country's export control system for strategic items and posted the change on its official gazette, marking its full implementation.  
Kim Bum-soo has more.  

Report: Japan no longer enjoys preferential treatment in export approval procedures by South Korea.

The revised trade control measure went into effect Wednesday, dropping Japan from South Korea’s "whitelist" of most trusted trading partners.

Lee Ho-hyeon, director general for international trade policy at the South Korean Trade Ministry, claimed the change does not target a specific nation.

[Sound bite: Lee Ho-hyeon - director general, Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy's trade policy bureau (Korean)]
"The purpose of the amended trade regulations are to improve South Korea's exports control system, not to strengthen a regulation on a certain item or to impose an embargo against a certain country."   

The tit-for-tat move came after Japan removed South Korea from its own whitelist last month. In July, Tokyo also tightened export controls on key high-tech materials to South Korean chip and display makers.  

[Sound bite: Lee Ho-hyeon - director general, Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy's trade policy bureau (Korean)]  
"In response to the question of whether these measures are corresponding actions to Japan's measures in controlling exports and strengthening export regulations, this is not the case. The reason is that the fundamental background or objective of Japan's export regulation measures and our measures are different. We made the decision based on the standard of regions where international cooperation is possible. However, Japan basically used export regulations for political purposes."  

The South Korean trade official stressed that Seoul is open and ready for dialogue, which it has continuously asked for. 

Seoul-Tokyo relations hit rock bottom after the South Korean Supreme Court last year ordered Japanese companies to pay reparations to Korean victims of Japan's forced labor during World War II.

Just last week, Seoul brought its trade frictions with Japan to the World Trade Organization(WTO). The global trade authority requires the two sides to meet within 30 days before opening a case. If they fail to resolve their problem, a long WTO dispute settlement process will begin to adjudicate the case.   
Kim Bum-soo, KBS World Radio News.