The U.S. International Trade Commission voted Monday to revoke anti-dumping duties on some steel products from Japan and Italy, but kept them in place for South Korea, Indonesia and India.

Kaoru Okamoto, chairman of the Japan Steel Information Center, said Japanese producers hope the panel's 4-2 vote to lift duties on cut-to-length carbon-quality steel plate from Japan will be the first of many to come.

"The Japanese steel industry hopes that the stance exemplified by this decision will be maintained in future sunset reviews and that existing antidumping measures on Japanese steel products, many of which have been in place for many years, will be revoked as soon as possible," he said.

U.S. steel companies have aggressively used U.S. trade remedy laws over the years to stop imports of foreign steel they say are unfairly priced or subsidized.

If the Commerce Department and the ITC find proof of unfair trade practices that are hurting U.S. producers or threatening them with injury, duties are imposed.

But global trade rules require the United States and other members to review anti-dumping or countervailing duty orders every five years to determine if they are still needed.