In January, Iran seized a South Korean-flagged chemical tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, citing alleged environmental violations.
This money has become a thorn in relations between the countries, whose ties have historically been so close that they both have streets named after each other in their respective capitals. South Korea stopped importing Iranian oil in May 2019 and South Korean banks froze $7 billion in Iranian assets from the prior sale of crude oil and gas condensate to abide by US sanctions. According to the Iranian embassy in Seoul, trade between the two countries, which amounted to $12 billion in 2017, dropped by half in 2018 and plunged to a mere $111 million in the first six months of 2020.
South Korean technology giants LG and Samsung, which had dominated the Iranian home-appliance market, left in November 2018. These longstanding economic ties were severely disrupted after the Donald Trump administration withdrew from the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement and re-imposed sanctions in May 2018. Iran used to be South Korea’s third-largest Middle East trading partner.
