Could Korea seek compensation from China over fine dust pollution?

Heavy fine dust hangs over Busan, Monday. Yonhap

Each winter in Korea brings familiar visitors: biting winds, early sunsets and a haze of fine dust.

Last week, the government finalized its plan for the seventh seasonal fine dust management program, which has run every winter since 2019 to enforce stricter controls on air pollution from December through March.

A central element of the plan is deepening cooperation with China, a major contributor to Korea’s air pollution. Ahn Joon-young, a senior researcher at the National Institute of Environmental Research, noted that multiple studies have traced a substantial portion of Korea’s fine dust to China — a fact that Beijing is also said to acknowledge.

In May and June 2016, the National Institute of Environmental Research (NIER) and NASA conducted a joint air-quality study in Korea with about 400 experts from 93 research teams, including the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Measurements of PM2.5 fine dust at Olympic Park in southeastern Seoul's Songpa District — considered the country’s most reliable site for comparing ground and aerial data — indicated that 52 percent originated domestically, while 48 percent came from abroad.

Of the overseas share, 34 percent of that originated from inland China and 9 percent from North Korea.

In 2019, the first report to involve China directly confirmed the country’s contribution to Korea’s fine dust pollution.

The Joint Research Project for Long-range Transboundary Air Pollutants in Northeast Asia — a study by scientists from Korea, China and Japan examining cross-border air pollution since 2000 — found that China had the highest fine dust emissions among the three countries.

Heavy fine dust hangs over Jongno District, central Seoul, Nov. 25. Yonhap

According to the report, 51 percent of the annual average PM2.5 in Seoul, Daejeon and Busan in 2017 came from domestic sources, while 49 percent originated from abroad.

Within the overseas share, 32 percent came from China and 2 percent from Japan.

An analysis released in October by NIER, conducted in collaboration with NASA between February and March last year, found that roughly 55 percent of Korea’s PM2.5 fine dust originated in China, while 29 percent came from domestic sources.

In 2017, 90 individuals, including environmental activists, filed a lawsuit against the Korean and Chinese governments over fine dust pollution, demanding compensation. However, the court dismissed the case three years later.

Judges concluded that Korean courts had no jurisdiction over China and saw no grounds to claim that Korean officials had acted unlawfully in managing fine dust.

China did not participate in the case, arguing that doing so could infringe on its sovereignty and security. It also cited the international law principle of sovereign immunity, under which one state is not subject to another’s jurisdiction.

Experts say that seeking compensation from China would be highly unlikely to succeed in practice.

“China would need to have violated international law to be held liable, and proving that would be extremely difficult,” said Lee Jae-min, an international law professor at Seoul National University.

Lee added that while it is one thing to prove that pollutants originate from China’s industrial activity and reach Korea at levels significant enough to warrant legal compensation, it is another to establish China’s legal responsibility.

He noted that China could argue Korea’s air pollution stems from multiple sources, and because fine dust has multiple contributors, determining China’s exact share of responsibility is highly difficult.

“Even if that could be proven, holding China liable would require showing that Beijing knew its industrial activity was causing significant environmental harm to Korea and could have prevented it but did not,” Lee said.

He said the evidentiary burden is not unique to Korea and China, noting that similar cross-border disputes require comparable proof and long-term data.

The Ministry of Environment told The Korea Times that seeking compensation from China contradicts the government’s stance.

“We believe the priority is for the two countries to cooperate to reduce fine dust,” a ministry official said. “Demanding compensation would effectively place blame on China, which goes against the government’s position.”

She added, “If we claim damages for harm caused by China’s fine dust, we should also have to demand the same compensation domestically from companies that emit air pollution.”