Junko SUETOMI

Introduction

Junko Suetomi is a partner in the Baker & McKenzie Tokyo office and leads the firm’s international trade and dispute resolution practice. Suetomi focuses on international trade laws and regulations, WTO dispute settlement, civil and criminal litigation, antitrust law, bankruptcy law and general corporate law. She has extensive experience advising clients on trade remedy matters, such as anti-dumping and countervailing duties, import restrictions, customs issues, export control and sanctions, tariff treatment and FTA/EPA (free trade agreement/economic partnership agreement) applications and public procurements.

Prior to joining Baker & McKenzie, Suetomi worked in the WTO Dispute Settlement Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Economics Bureau. She has served as a court-appointed defence attorney in many criminal cases and has authored and co-authored numerous publications in her areas of expertise. She is an associate professor of Waseda University and a lecturer at the National Tax College. She is also a member of the Japan Association of International Economic Law.

Suetomi has served as an expert member of the Ministry of Finance’s Council on Customs, Tariff, Foreign Exchange and Other Transactions since 13 March 2019. She was appointed bar examiner by the Minister of Justice from November 2020 to November 2023. She was also an expert member of the Financial Council of the Financial Services Agency from October 2021 to October 2023. Suetomi was also the chair of the Human Rights Committee of the Tokyo Bar Association.

She is admitted to practice in both Japan and New York. Suetomi has received her LLB from the University of Tokyo and Kyushu University, and her LLM from New York University School of Law and Cornell Law School. She has completed judicial training at the Legal Research and Institute of the Supreme Court of Japan. In March 2021, she obtained a certificate in business analytics from the Harvard business analytics programme.