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Last-minute trade deal clinched at WTO meeting
(AP)
Updated: 2005-12-18 18:52
HONG KONG - Trade negotiators reached a breakthrough Sunday on a last-minute
deal, likely averting a collapse in talks that could have seriously crippled the
World Trade Organization's ability to promote global free trade.
Meanwhile, about 1,000 demonstrators marched through downtown Hong Kong in an
anti-WTO parade, a day after hundreds of protesters were arrested in one of the
city's worst spasms of street violence in decades.
Escorted by
security officers, WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy leaves the Hong Kong
Convention and Exhibition Center after an overnight meeting Sunday, Dec.
18, 2005. The last-minute negotiations at the WTO summit were focused on
whether delegates could agree on a date to end export subsidies, with
developing nations saying a deal had been struck while the European Union
said there still was no agreement. [AP] | The
demonstrators chanted "Sink WTO" as trade ministers from around the globe
wrapped up six days of negotiations at a World Trade Organization meeting. The
protesters claim that the WTO's attempts to open up markets benefit big
companies and the rich at the expense of ordinary workers and the poor.
The tentative agreement, coming after all-night negotiations, calls for
wealthy countries to eliminate farm export subsidies by 2013. It paves the way
for a modest agreement to cut trade barriers across various sectors, according
to a copy of the final draft agreement obtained by journalists.
The draft was to be submitted for approval by all 149 WTO member nations and
territories later Sunday. Since the WTO is a consensus-based organization, an
objection by even one member could torpedo a final deal.
But delegates appeared to be moving toward agreement.
Brazil Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said the draft was "reasonable" and
hopes it will adopted by all WTO members later Sunday.
"We welcome it," said India's Trade Minister Kamal Nath. "It is focused and
it strikes at various problems of developing countries."
The 2013 date was a key demand of the 25-nation European Union, which held
out against intense pressure from Brazil and other developing nations to phase
out many of its farm export subsidies by 2010. Developing nations say the
government farm payments to promote exports undercut the competitive advantage
of poor farmers.
The revised text also sets April 30, 2006, as a new deadline to work out
formulas for cutting farm and industrial tariffs and subsidies åK½ï¿½ a key step
toward forging a sweeping global free trade treaty by the end of next year.
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