US Designates South Korea as ‘Sensitive Concern’ over Martial Law and Nuclear Weapons Biden, ‘Democratic’ Yoon Seok-yeol ‘Far-Right’ Confrontation

US Designates South Korea as ‘Sensitive Concern’ over Martial Law and Nuclear Weapons Biden, ‘Democratic’ Yoon Seok-yeol ‘Far-Right’ Confrontation

The United States has designated South Korea as a ‘sensitive country’ due to martial law and nuclear weapons concerns under the Democratic administration and added a ‘review process for visit cooperation.’

South Korea has been requesting 'exemption as an exception' for its allies from tariffs imposed on most countries under the Republican Trump administration, while keeping the designation of 'sensitive countries' hidden from the Democratic administration in the US for three months.
The U.S. Department of Energy announced through a spokesperson on the 14th that it had designated its ally South Korea as a ‘sensitive’ country amid the South Korean president’s brief declaration of martial law and discussions about the possibility of South Korea developing nuclear weapons.
The then-Democratic Joe Biden administration placed South Korea at the lowest level of the list of sensitive and other designated countries in January, just before Biden left office, the Energy Department said in a written response to Reuters’ inquiries.
The U.S. State Department told Reuters that while the designation does not prohibit scientific or technical cooperation, “visits and cooperation with the countries on the list are subject to prior internal review.” The Democratic Party administration's designation of a "sensitive country" has led to the right-wing South Korean government being targeted for surveillance as a "country of concern" for developing nuclear weapons.
During the Biden administration's South Korea-US summit, the US emphasized a "democratic alliance" and "prioritizing dialogue with North Korea," while the Yoon Seok-yeol administration continued to confront the US by strengthening the far-right system of "spreading liberal values" and "spreading freedom to North Korea," and supported the restoration of the hard-line conservative Trump regime in the US presidential election.
It appears that the designation of South Korea as a "sensitive country" was made due to concerns that the extreme right-wing terrorist state regime was strengthening the tendency of South Korea under the Yoon regime to destroy the democratic foreign policy of the United States by expanding freedom to North Korea and applying "Koreans" to North Korean residents, and that the extreme right-wing party was joining in by calling martial law an "exercise of presidential power."
A 2017 document posted on the US Department of Justice website states that the Justice Department's list of sensitive countries includes China, Taiwan, Israel, Russia, Iran, and North Korea, and Tehran and Pyongyang are designated as "terrorists."

Reuters reported that “President Yoon Seok-yeol and then-Minister of National Defense Kim Yong-hyun were among those who raised the view that South Korea would have no choice but to pursue nuclear weapons amid concerns about North Korea’s nuclear program and concerns about its U.S. alliance,” and that “President Yoon backed off his comments about a nuclear weapons program after negotiating the 2023 agreement with President Biden, under which Washington would provide South Korea with greater insight into U.S. plans to deter and respond to nuclear accidents in the region, and in return, South Korea would reiterate its commitment not to pursue its own nuclear bomb and to comply with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, to which it has signed.”

Reuters continued that “But that alone was not enough to dispel doubts about the U.S. defense commitments that have fueled South Korea’s demand to acquire nuclear weapons,” and that “Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yeol told the National Assembly last month that nuclear weapons were not ‘off the table. ’” Roy said, “It is premature to discuss such a plan,” but reported that Minister Cho stated at a National Assembly hearing, “Given that the international situation is unfolding in an unpredictable direction, this is a principled response that we must prepare for all possible scenarios,” revealing the policy of “preparing for nuclear armament.”

 

Reuters specifically reported on Minister Cho's "deliberate avoidance of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' duties," saying that "he appeared before Congress and said that his department had not received any official contact from the Biden administration and only heard about the possibility of designation through unofficial tips," regarding the fact that the US had concealed the fact of the designation in January until now.

Daryl Kimball, executive director of the nonprofit Arms Control Association, told Reuters that in light of these “provocative” statements, South Korea poses a nuclear proliferation risk and that the State Department was cautious in putting South Korea on the proliferation risk list.

He told Reuters that “by designating South Korea as a proliferation sensitive state, we should exclude the possibility that South Korea would seek US approval for uranium enrichment and spent nuclear fuel reprocessing,” and that the request for reprocessing approval was “for the purpose of producing nuclear weapons.”
Reuters reported that “the US State Department did not explain why the Asian country was added to the list, nor did it say whether President Trump intends to reverse the action,” adding that “the spokesperson said that South Korea would not face any new restrictions on bilateral cooperation in the areas of science and technology, and the designation will take effect on April 15, according to media reports.”

The US Department of Energy (DOE) responded to Yonhap News on the 14th, saying that “the previous administration added South Korea to the lowest category of the ‘Sensitive Countries and Other Designated Countries List’ (SCL) in early January 2025, the ‘Other Designated Countries,’” Yonhap News reported on the 16th. According to the DOE website, a sensitive country is a country that requires special consideration for policy reasons, and the coalition said that the DOE can include a country on the sensitive country list for reasons such as national security, nuclear nonproliferation, regional instability, economic security threats, and support for terrorism.

The coalition went on to say that given that the United States includes Israel, an “ally” in the Middle East, and Taiwan, a “quasi-ally” in the Indo-Pacific region, in the “sensitive country” category along with hostile countries or “state sponsors of terrorism,” there is a possibility that it is related to nuclear nonproliferation issues.

Acting President Choi Sang-mok said on the 11th that U.S. President Trump’s “America First” policy is starting to target South Korea, and that “discussions with the U.S. on tariff measures and strengthening cooperation on energy and shipbuilding have begun ahead of the “reciprocal tariffs” that will take effect on April 2.”
Acting President Choi said, “I have instructed the government to communicate more actively with the U.S. administration to resolve misunderstandings about tariffs,” and that “the South Korean Trade Minister has asked the U.S. to ‘exempt’ South Korea from the reciprocal tariffs if they take effect in April,” Reuters reported on the 15th.
Reuters reported that “the Ministry of Trade issued a statement saying that Trade Representative Chung In-kyo, who visited Washington this week, met with U.S. Trade Representative Jamison Greer and told him that South Korea should not be treated unfavorably.”

<Biden ‘Equality, Freedom and Justice’ Yoon Seok-yeol ‘Law and Protection of Freedom’, December 14, 2022>
<Yoon Seok-yeol’s Freedom Misjudgment Biden’s Freedom Error Twitter, May 1, 2023>
<Yoon Seok-yeol ‘Biden’s Democratic Uprising’ Far-Right Coup Approaching Trump as a ‘Strong Person’ Who Spreads Freedom, January 5, 2025>
<Yoon Seok-yeol’s ‘Value Alliance’ Japan’s ‘Law and Justice’ Canada’s ‘Energy Security’ Germany’s ‘Value Profits’, May 15, 2023>