Oil company protests its innocence in court filing

S-Oil has filed suit against the Fair Trade Commission’s ruling that it had participated in price-fixing for oil.
In February, the Fair Trade Commission fined four oil companies, including S-Oil, 52.6 billion won ($56.8 million) each for allegedly colluding on oil prices for 70 days in 2004, between April and June.
The watchdog claimed that the price-fixing had led to damages of 240 billion won.
S-Oil, however, stated that it did not participate in any price-fixing and filed an administrative suit in the Seoul High Court last Friday.
Usually, companies that disagree with the FTC would file an objection and then go to the court if the objection were not accepted, but S-Oil skipped the process of filing an objection.
“We wanted to make a clear statement that our company is innocent,” S-Oil said.
The other three companies that were fined with S-Oil ― SK Corp., GS Caltex, and Hyundai Oilbank ― all filed an objection to the Fair Trade Commission. The other three companies said they may press charges if their objections are overruled.

By Kwon Hyuk-joo JoongAng Ilbo [wohn@joongang.co.kr]