Nov 28, 1984
U.S. THREATS IN GATT IRRITATES OTHERS.
GENEVA, NOVEMBER 27 (IFDA/CHAKRAVARTHI RAGHAVAN) – Informal negotiations on the GATT work programme and trade policy issues were resuming Tuesday, with other delegates irritated and angry over U.S. threats over the GATT budget and recourse to bilateralism.-The consultations were being conducted by the chairman of the GATT Council, Amb. Felipe Jaramillo of Colombia, on the services and counterfeit trade issues, as the Contracting Parties continue their 40th annual meeting.- On both the Third World countries challenge GATT competence and jurisdiction.- Informal consultations over last week end broke up Sunday, amid veiled threats by the U.S. that if it did not get its way, it might block the GATT budget approval apart from blocking decisions on other parts of the work programme.- At a diplomatic reception Monday night by the chairman of the Contracting Parties, delegates of the Third World, and of several Industrial countries too, appeared irritated over the U.S. tactics.- One delegate from an Industrial country said that the U.S. tactics had so irritated the Third World group that their positions had hardened.- Throughout last weekend, this delegate said that during the informal negotiations at the level of a small group of key Ambassadors, Third World countries while standing firm on their position the GATT had no jurisdiction in services and counterfeit issues, nevertheless were trying to find some compromises that would enable the U.S. Administration to meet its domestic pressures.- However, on Sunday evening the U.S. put forward proposals that would in effect have resulted in an affirmation of GATT jurisdiction and appropriateness of GATT actions on the services issue, and given the GATT secretariat a role in analysing the services issues and making proposals and comments on the appropriate GATT actions that the very nature of the organisation precludes the secretariat from performing.- The general agreement does not even envisage a secretariat, and only Contracting Parties can make proposals or provide analysis, and the secretariat is not a Contracting Party only "a contracted party", one Third World delegate commented.- Over and above this, the U.S. is reported to have repeated the view that while the U.S. preferred multilateralism, it would use bilateral measures if needed to achieve its objectives.- Also, the U.S. delegate would appear to have said that if no satisfactory solution on services issue was possible, he would not merely block approval of any agreements and understandings on other parts of the GATT work programme, but also the GATT budget for 1985.- When the budget issue had come before the GATT Council in November, the U.S. had said that the report of the Budget Committee had been forwarded to Washington, and that the final action would be taken at the annual meeting of the CPs. He had also said that he did not want to stand in the way of a consensus on this in the Council, and hoped he would not have to raise the issue again.- At that time other delegates would appear to have taken this to mean that the U.S. delegate had not received instructions, and his stand represented no more than this, particularly since he had said that the delegation had recommended to Washington acceptance of the budget.- But during the weekend negotiations and since then the U.S. would appear to have been dropping hints that it might hold up the budget.- Third World delegates add that it seemed about time that the rest of the world, and specially the Third World, realised that yielding to U.S. threats and postures in international organisations was nothing more than appeasement, and the U.S. would never be satisfied until its hegemony was established.- "Munich has its lessons for U.S. too", one Third World delegate commented.- "While we would lose something if GATT is paralysed, they would lose more, and it is after all their organisation", another Third World delegate said.- Third World countries have stood firm in their refusal to agree to GATT activities in the areas of trade in services and other U.S. demands, as a price for further work in the implementation of the GATT work programme mandated by the GATT Ministerial declaration of 1982.- A statement by Amb. S. P. Shukla of India on behalf of the Third World group in GATT, circulated as an official document to the CPs, said that while the Third World was committed to achieving genuine trade liberalisation within the framework of the multilateral trading system, "they cannot, however, accept that the onus for bringing about trade liberalisation be shifted on to them".- The preservation of the multilateral system was the necessary first step before it could be strengthened, and this required actions by the Industrial countries, and the implementation by them of their commitments on standstill and rollback of restrictions, inconsistent with GATT, on the exports of the Third World.- If this was done, and if all other aspects of the current GATT work programme of particular interest to the Third world was implemented on a priority basis, the Third World would be willing to propose specific trade negotiations in GATT, the group said.- "Such specific trade negotiations must be confined to trade in goods only, and should cover manufactured and semi-processed goods as well as agricultural and natural resource products and encompass the totality of tariff and non-tariff barriers", the group insisted.- The report of the GATT Council to the Contracting Parties showed that the year-long discussions in the sectoral GATT Committees and working groups, and the GATT Council itself, on various items on the GATT work programme for the 1980’s, have resulted in agreements and understandings, though mostly of a procedural nature, for carrying the work forward in many for these areas in 1985.- However, there has been a deadlock on four issues – the trade in services, counterfeit trade, exchange rate fluctuations, and high technology.- Intense informal negotiations over the weekend, GATT sources add, had resulted in some understanding on how to deal in the future in GATT on the exchange rates and high technology issues, but there was complete deadlock on the trade in services and counterfeit trade issues.- Third World countries in GATT have refused to acknowledge any GATT competence to deal with trade in services, and insist that the General Agreement could deal only with trade in goods, and the GATT principles and rules applicable to trade in goods were inapplicable to the trade in services sector.- Counterfeit trade problems, they say, should be tackled in the world intellectual property organisation, which administers the Paris Union on Patents and Trade Marks, and has competence and jurisdiction in this area.- In an effort to break the deadlock, Third World group was reported to have been agreeable to continue the current "informal consultations" that had been going on in GATT in the services and counterfeit trade issues, without prejudice to their position on GATT involvement, with a view to see whether any possible solutions could be found.- However, on Sunday the U.S. is reported to have put forward a proposal for the CPs to agree on an "institutional framework" in GATT on the services issue, involving a determination on the appropriateness of joint actions in GATT.- The U.S. also wanted the GATT secretariat, which has so far been restricted to a "neutral role" of providing conferences and other facilities for informal consultations, to take a more active role, including preparation of documentation through analysis and synthesis of various viewpoints, and for consultations with private sector organisations and international organisations.- The Third World negotiators rejected this.- At a meeting Monday morning of the Third World group, this position was affirmed, and the U.S. paper, and its efforts to establish a linkage between the services issue and the GATT work programme, was hardly criticised, participants in the meeting said.-