[3] The agreement was the most comprehensive the EU had ever negotiated up until that point: import duties are near eliminated on all produce and there is deep liberalisation in trade in services.

[6] The agreement is commonly referred to as the first of the next generation FTAs signed by the EU that addresses trade concerns beyond tariffs.

[12] The agreement eliminates tariffs on 98% of import duties and trade barriers in manufactured goods, agricultural products and services over a period of five years.

[14][15][16] South Korea has had significant opposition to previous free trade agreements most especially with the United States.

However, Hur Kyung-wook, Vice Finance Minister for South Korea, has said that he believes the agreement will go into effect in July 2010.

[17] On 22 March 2011, the citizen group called Lawyers for Democratic Society (민주사회를 위한 변호사모임) announced that there were 160 cases of mistranslation errors in the Korean version of the document.

While EU criticizes South Korean government that they do not fully abolish capital punishment, but according to various public surveys, many respondents in South Korea opposed EU's request to abolish death penalty due to its desired need to give admonition to heinous criminal.

For example, in one public survey conducted by Gallup Korea on September 13–14, 2021, 77.3% of the participant answered that capital punishment should be done.

Also, European Union's own act causes contradiction to their criticism toward South Korean government, since EU signed free trade agreement with Vietnam and Singapore, where they retain capital punishment.