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US President Donald Trump holds up a chart as he announces reciprocal tariffs on a slew of nations on April 2, 2025, from the White House Rose Garden. (AFP/Yonhap)

US President Donald Trump officially announced Wednesday that the US will impose “reciprocal” tariffs of 25% on all products manufactured in Korea and imported into the US. Countries that are not under reciprocal tariffs will still face a “baseline” tariff of 10%. The baseline tariffs will take effect on April 5, and the reciprocal tariffs on April 9.

Trump detailed the reciprocal tariffs in a speech from the White House Rose Garden on Wednesday afternoon. Some of the main countries and regions facing the supposedly reciprocal tariffs are South Korea (25%), China (34%), the EU (20%), Vietnam (46%), Taiwan (32%), Japan (24%), India (26%) and the UK (10%).

A senior White House official had earlier told reporters that the baseline tariff would be 10% and that Trump would announce higher reciprocal tariffs on the worst offenders at the press conference.

Trump held up a yearly report on national trade barriers published on March 31 by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) while stating that non-tariff barriers to trade are even worse than tariffs. Trump went on to claim that the US’ trading partners had thrown up ridiculous non-tariff barriers in a bid to wreck American industry.

The USTR’s report enumerates a range of Korea’s non-tariff barriers to trade. Korea has virtually no tariffs on the US because of the two countries’ free trade agreement.

By Kim Won-chul, Washington correspondent

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