By Wendy Anders

South Korea will hold meetings this week with six Central American countries for a legal review of their pending free trade agreement, said South Korean media sources.

A team from Seoul’s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy will meet its counterparts from Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and Honduras for three days of negotiations starting Monday, Feb. 13.

The seven nations hope to review the entire deal, which covers commodities, service investment and place of origin, and ultimately, produce a finalized text.

South Korea and Central America started to negotiate the agreement in 2015, and reached a final accord last November. It is expected that the final agreement will be signed and take effect by June 30, 2017.

In 2016, Salvadoran exports to Korea reached US$8.6 million and imports amounted to US$108 million, said Central America’s Summa business magazine.

Korea’s trade with the six countries reached four billion U.S. dollars in 2015, accounting for about 0.4 percent of Seoul’s total trade, said local South Korean media.