• Journal of Environmental Policy
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.1-28
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• 2007

Because the result of environmental pollution of one state is not limited to the national border but spills over into neighboring countries or global environment either directly or indirectly, international discussions on environment are crucial in domestic environmental law and policy. International environmental law demands differential obligation between developed and developing countries in the principle of 'common but differentiated responsibility'. The common but differentiated responsibility is the principle that draws distinction between developed and developing countries about global environmental issues, while recognizing the common responsibility of environmental protection for all nations. Environmental technology transfer or financial support from developed countries to developing countries, for example, has been discussed. The problem is the status of Korea. Korea's international environmental policy will be different by the distinction of responsibility for international environmental protection according to the status of developed and developing countries. International communities have never established a clear standard distinguishing developed from developing countries in any international laws. The WTO entrusts each country to decide whether it is a developing country or not. In the international environmental law, the status of a country is determined by the ability to negotiate. The status of Korea, thus, cannot be fixed in general international law. Rather, the Korean government is able to choose its own status strategically, It can be a policy choice to insist that Korea's developing country so as to reduce the burden of international responsibility. But, considering an economic indicator and environmental pollution indicator at which Korea ranks about 10th, the reality of Korea is much closer to a developed country. Positive policies such as development of environment-friendly technologies and products should be preferred to defensive assertion of developing country.

• Korean Security Journal
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• no.36
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• pp.201-225
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• 2013

The link between transnational environmental harm and national security has attracted new attention due to the environmental crisis such as climate change, nuclear accidents and, pollution. However, both domestic and international environmental regimes are still tied to the unsuccessful and unclear notion-sustainable development. The present author argues that environment should be considered as a security matter for the effective environmental protection. If, for example, a nation committed a serious environmental harm and the effects spans borderlines, and the source nation refuses to cooperate or compensate, would sustainable development still be an appropriate measure? Then, what would be the victim state's tool to protect its own security? The present author first looks into the possibility utilizing UN Security Council. But due to its limited legality and effectiveness in this environmental matter the present author would like to propose a non-traditional but a not-brand new method. This new method reflects two new trends both from international law and security areas. First, this approach clearly moves from the military focused security concept to broader security concept. Second, this is also a shift from traditional international law to transnational law. With these two new approaches, we will find a more suitable answer both for securing national environmental security and for protecting environment.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Marine Environment & Safety
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.125-135
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• 1996

I hope that in the limited allotted to me today I managed to draw to your attention just some of the recent legal developments relation to international maritime safety and environmental protection or more simply, of safer ships and cleaner seas, none of us should be in any doubt the ever increasing pressure that is going to be placed upon the shipping industry to achieve the objectives to which those expressions refer.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.14
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• pp.349-370
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• 2000

The environmental problems such as global climate change, global waming, ozone depletion, environmental pollution have been caused by the rapid economic growth, increasing in use of fossil fuels for industrialization and scientific technology development. Especially human activities are significantly altering the atomosphere's composition and its radiative properties. To Stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system, the international community adopted the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992 and Kyoto protocol in 1997. Also to protect ozone layer the international community adopted the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer in 1985, and the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer in 1987. To achieve global environmental objectives, some multilateral environmental agreements includes trade regulation. For example, Montreal Protocol includes the provisions to regulate the world trade of the sudstances which might destroy ozone layer. However Kyoto Protocol has no provisions to regulate trade and is not in force yet. Although there is no trade regulation article in Kyoto Protocol, the international world trade will be influenced by limitation and reduction of CO2 and strengthening the CO2 emission standard for import good. For example Korean car industy agreed with EU to reduce CO2 emission from new passenger car and Korean Semiconductor industry agreed with WSC(World Semiconductor Council) to reduce PFCs in 1999.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.12
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• pp.587-613
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• 1999

Environmental problems such as global climate change, depletion, ocean and air pollution, and resource degradation-compounded by an expanding world population-respect no border and threaten the health, prosperity and jobs of all mankind. Our efforts to promote democracy, free trade, and stability in the world will fall short unless people have a livable environment. We have an enormous stake in the management of the world's resources. By increasing demand for timber, natural gas, coal and consumer's goods have destroyed the grounds for living. Greenhouse gas emissions anywhere in the world have threatened coastal communities, and then changed the Earth's climate system. The burning of coal, oil, and other fossil fuels is increasing substantially the concentration of heat-trapping gasses such as carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide in our air. The earth's temperature and sea levels are rising as a result. Since 1972 there has been a marked growth in the number and scope of environmental treaties. In particular, after the 1992 Rio Conference, international legal instruments became more concentrated on addressing environment within the context of sustainable development and incorporated a number of new concepts and innovative approaches. A preliminary analysis of recent conventions and in particular those associated with the Rio Conference indicates various ideas, concepts and principles which have come to the fore including sustainable development, equity, common concern of humankind, common but differentiated responsibilities and global partnership. However, international trade also has an environmental impact which must be minimized or countered. Positive measures are to be preferred to achieve environmental goals, but where trade provisions are necessary, they should be appropriately used within environmental conventions to facilitate the reduction and limitation of the negative impacts of trade and to enhance the complementarity of the multilateral trade regime with the imperatives of environmental protection, in the interests of environmental protection and sustainable development generally. The international community has to recognize and endorse this need to achieve complementarity between trade and environment issues.

• Journal of Environmental Policy
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.31-54
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• 2004

This paper aims at analyzing the issues on how to improve UNEP's roles in international environmental governance context. Although UNEP has been presumed to play a leading role in addressing global environment problems, several problems (such as collective action problem, fragmentation, lack of authority and insufficient legitimacy) in its governance have led to losing its leadership to other entities such as the World Bank, OECD and CSD. While a position of changing UNEP's status to an independent international organization has not been developed enough, several efforts, which might not be sufficient to respond to the changing environment of international environmental governance, have been made to strengthen UNEP's roles in the short run. These include universal membership, strengthening the financing of UNEP, and issues concerning MEAs. Whether current efforts for enhancing UNEP's roles in international environmental governance will be successful or not, would rely on to what extent interested parties hold political wills for its reforms and how to draw a compromise on critical issues among those parties.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.273-285
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• 2006

As the political arguments on international power concept has gradually been deepened, the role of international regimes, defined as principles, norms, rules, and decision-making procedures around which nation-actors' expectations converge in a given issue-area, has also been reinforced. There are many ways of understanding about international regimes. In terms of realistic theories, international regimes are one of methods of maintaining hegemonic power order of hegemonic nation and in terms of liberalistic theories, international regimes are understood as the products of mutual inter-dependence of nations in changing international society. As a matter of fact, if we take structural causes and regime consequences into severe consideration, we can find not a few characteristics of international regimes, such as security regime, world trade and fiance regime, ocean regime, environmental regime, human right regime, etc. This paper will examine the changing concept of power after World War II in three categories of hard power (military power), meta power (regime creating power), and soft power (advanced in cultural, diplomatical, and technological power). This paper will provide the evidence of why the changing power concepts will be strongly related with the emergence of international regimes. The UN convention on the law of the sea will chosen as a standard case of the ocean regime and it's regime structure and role will also be analysed in both realistic :md liberalistic theories. Futhermore, the nations' interests involved in the UN convention on the law of the sea will be analytically classified and finally a future prospectus of the UN convention on the law of the sea as an ocean regime will be tested.

• The Korean Journal of Air & Space Law and Policy
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.153-194
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• 2009

The resources of outer space are for the common exploitation of mankind, and it is a common responsibility of mankind to protect the outer space environment. With the rapid development of space science and technology, and especially with the busy space activities of some major space powers, environmental contamination or space debris is steadily increasing in quantity and has brought grave potential threats and actual damage to the outer space environment and human activities in space. Especially We must mitigate and seek out a solution to remove space debris which poses a threat directly to man's exploitation and use of outer space activities in the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and in the Geostationary Orbit (GEO), through international cooperation and agreement in the fields of space science, economics, politics and law, in order to safeguard the life and property of mankind and protect the earth's environment. While the issue of space debris has been the subject of scientific study and discussion for some time now, it has yet to be fully addressed within the context of an international legal framework. During the earlier stages of the space age, which began in the late 1950s, the focus of international lawmakers and diplomats was the establishment of basic rules which sought to define the legal nature of outer space and set out the parameters for space activities and the nature and scope of activities carried out in outer space were quite limited. Consequently, environmental issues and the risks that might arise from the generation of space debris did not receive priority attention within the context of the development international space law. In recent years, however, the world has seen dramatic advances in technology and increases in the type and number of space-related activities which are being carried out. In addition, the number of actors in this field has exploded from two highly developed States to a vast array of different States, intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations, including private industry. Therefore, the number of artificial objects in the near-Earth space is continually increasing. As has been previously mentioned, COPUOS was the entity that created the existing five treaties, and five sets of legal Principles, which form the core of space law, and COPUOS is clearly the most appropriate entity to oversee the creation of this regulatory body for the outer space environmental problem. This idea has been proposed by various States and also at the ILA Conference in Buenos Aires. The ILA Conference in Buenos Aires produced an extensive proposal for such a regulatory regime, dealing with space debris issues in legal terms This article seeks to discuss the status of international law as it relates to outer space environmental problem and space debris and indicate a course of action which might be taken by the international community to develop a legal framework which can adequately cope with the complexity of issues that have recently been recognized. In Section Ⅱ,Ⅲ and IV of this article discuss the current status of international space law, and the extent to which some of the issues raised by earth and space environment are accounted for within the existing United Nations multilateral treaties. Section V and VI discuss the scope and nature of space debris issues as they emerged from the recent multi-year study carried out by the ILA, Scientific and Technical Subcommittee, Legal Subcommittee of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space ("COPUOS") as a prelude to the matters that will require the attention of international lawmakers in the future. Finally, analyzes the difficulties inherent in the future regulation and control of space debris and the activities to protect the earth's environment. and indicates a possible course of action which could well provide, at the least, a partial solution to this complex challenge.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Navigation
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.77-97
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• 1995

The protection of the marine environment is one of the main international legal problems in recent years. In parallel with the industrial development, a great quantity of chemical materials were used and in consequence, mass transportation of oil and other dangerous materials was required on the one hand, and discharge of industrial wasters drew also the attention on the other hand. Furthermore, oil tankers accidents, mass use of nuclear materials, sea-bed exploration and exploitation stimulated further deep human concern on the marine environment. The expansion of international concern to new and more dangerous sources of marine pollution regarded more strict and legal control on the Oil Tanker(DWT 95, 000tons, Cb=0.805) model. Calculation results are compared to the international, especially regional level. In particular, this study is concerned with the preservation of the Northeast Asian Seas surrounded by Japan, the Russian Far East, South Korea, North Korea, China and Taiwan. These adjacent countries must intensify cooperation regarding the prevention, reduction and control of the contamination of the sea. And this cooperation between the States concerned should, as much as possible, be aimed at maximizing the effectiveness of measures to prevent or abate transboundary environmental pollution. To achieve this purpose, States concerned should be imposed upon duties such as duty to assess the environmental impact, duty to inform, duty to consult and duty to assist on the basis of general principle of international law, international customary law and other various resolutions of international bodies. Depending on the nature and extent of actual or potential transboundary pollution with the use of a natural resource or the environment in general the establishment of some form of institutionalized cooperation between the States concerned may become useful or indispensable. The functions of this Organization are, inter alia, to keep the implementation of the Convention and the protocals under continuous observation, to make recommendations on regional or sub-regional rules and standards to be elaborated and on measures to be taken by the Contracting Parties, to be notified of any grave and imminent danger from pollution or threat of pollution by the Contracting Parties and to promote in close cooperation with appropriate governmental bodies additional measures to protect the marine environment of the Northeast Asian Seas, and so on. Above mentioned countries, first of all, are located within the Northeast Asian Seas geographically and, therefore, take responsibilities of preserving the clean sea against marine interferences regardless of any difference of the social, political and economic systems. They must be followed under the UNCLOS and other marine conventions. Under the present circumstances, Northeast Asian Seas will become dead seas in case that there is no instant and prompt action against pollution. Hence we have an absolute obligation to promote the development of the mandatory international environmental law, which in turn can faciliate more effective implementation of the regional cooperation by the neighbouring states within this area.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.345-384
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• 1996