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Non-discrimination is a fundamental principle of the World Trade Organization (WTO), which promotes global trade with the goal of eradicating hunger, reducing poverty, and ensuring global prosperity. According to the WTO rules, members are required to give other members most-favoured-nation and national treatment. Due to the military conflict between the Russian Federation and Ukraine, the United States, European Union, and several other member countries suspended most-favoured-nation treatment for Russian goods in mid-March 2022. This study examines the principle of non-discrimination under the WTO provisions, identifies relevant exceptions, analyses the Russia-Traffic in Transit case, and evaluates the appropriateness of the above actions by the US and others. Finally, this paper concludes that the US and its allies failed to present concrete evidence demonstrating a direct and causal relationship between the military situation in Ukraine and their own essential interests under Article XXI of GATT 1994. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States’ Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) introduces new eligibility requirements for existing USD 7,500 tax-credit provided to electric vehicles. The new requirements condition the credit upon North American final assembly and North American-sourced materials and components. As tensions flare between the US and China, these new local content requirements reflect the US’s effort to establish a supply chain for electric vehicles that circumvents China. The blow, however, is felt elsewhere, namely by South Korean auto makers whose electric vehicle models are no longer eligible for the significant tax-credit necessary to compete in the American market. As South Korea considers submitting a complaint to relevant international bodies, this paper dissects the IRA’s relevant provisions and analyzes the applicability of international trade law rules of the WTO and the Korea-US Free Trade Agreement to the new local content requirements of the IRA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's straight baseline regime deviates from the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea in a number of ways. Such discrepancies are likely to induce legal and political conflicts between countries, and also the settlement of which would not be easy, in particular, among the East Asian countries. In consideration of this point, the legal issues surrounding China's straight baselines and basepoints should be analyzed and evaluated not only from the perspectives of UNCLOS, but also through comparative analyses based on customary international law, State practices, and special circumstances. Many of China's State practices and laws based on straight baselines are neither in accordance with international laws, nor generally recognized as being in accordance with the international law of the sea. This paper provides important legal insights into China's straight baselines, which are unlawful from the perspectives of UNCLOS and State practices, and, in addition, suggest desirable ways to solve the problems in international laws. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]