Nov 29, 1984
U.S. GETS POSTPONEMENT OF WAIVER VOTE ON CBI.
GENEVA, NOVEMBER 27 (IFDA/CHAKRAVARTHI RAGHAVAN) -- The annual session of the GATT Contracting Parties agreed Tuesday to a U.S. request for postponement of the vote on its request for a GATT waiver relating to its Caribbean basin initiative, and remit the issue back to the GATT Council.-Nicaragua initially objected, pointing out that there was no precedent for acceding to such a request, but ultimately withdrew its objection.- The U.S. had requested that the issue should be remitted back to the GATT Council, which would enable the Council to seek a vote on the waiver request by polling capitals. The U.S. said that nearly 20 Contracting Parties, including some, beneficiaries, were absent from the session, and any vote at the session would not be representative.- Earlier, the CPs session agreed to put off consideration of its main agenda item relating to the GATT work programme, in view of the continuing negotiations to solve some of the outstanding issues like trade in services.- In taking up other issues, relating to the work and report of the GATT Council for the year, the Contracting Parties discussed among other things the trade in textiles and clothing, and some of the outstanding issues relating to panel rulings.- On most of these issues, the U.S. came in for critical comments, a GATT spokesman said.- On the textiles and clothing, Pakistan’s Mohammad Bajwa, speaking for the group of Third World exporting members of the Multifibre Arrangement (MFA), was highly critical of U.S. policies and actions in this sector, in violation of its obligations under the MFA and GATT.-Bajwa repeated the Third World complaints over U.S. policies over the last year - the December 1983 new regulations introducing additional criteria for "presumption of market disruption", and the large number of calls on Third World exporting countries for consultations and voluntary restraints on exports of particular products.- All U.S. actions, Bajwa complained, had been directed almost exclusively at Third World countries, including new entrants, small suppliers and cotton producers, in total contravention of the spirit and objectives and provisions of the MFA.-During the first nine months of 1984, as compared with the corresponding period of 1983, U.S. imports of textiles and clothing from non-restricted suppliers (from Industrial countries), rose at least twice more rapidly than imports from Third World MFA suppliers, Bajwa said.-This progressive erosion of the interests of the Third World countries was "exacerbated" by two sets of additional trade measures taken by the U.S. outside the framework of the MFA - the initiation of Counter-Vailing Duty (CVD) and Anti-Dumping (AD) investigations, against 13 Third World countries who were not members of the GATT, subsidies code, and the U.S. customs regulations changing rules of origin for textiles and textile products.-The CVD moves, without applying the "normal injury test" was against the spirit of the articles one and six of the General Agreement, and against the decision of the GATT Contracting Parties in November 1979 "which reaffirmed the inviolability of the unconditional most-favoured-nation treatment in the application of the Tokyo Round codes", Bajwa said.-The GATT Ministerial declaration of 1982 was "a firm and positive expression of political will to eliminate the regime of restriction and discrimination against textiles and clothing exports of the developing countries" and pursuit of concrete actions on this commitment was "a major test of credibility for the GATT system".-Bajwa on behalf of the Third World called for return of trade in this sector to normal GATT rules and principles and disciplines.- Bajwa's statement was supported by Sri Lanka, Hong Kong and Bangladesh.-U.S. representative, Michael Smith in replying said little of substance on these issues, and reserved his right, to come back to it at a later stage, a GATT spokesman said.- On the Hong Kong complaint of continued quota restrictions in France against imports from Hong Kong of digital quartz watches and a number of other items, and on which a panel had ruled in favour of Hong Kong, the representative of the EEC explained some of the measures, in the form of liberalisation of quotas already announced.-Further actions over the next three years would also be taken so that by January 1, 1987 there would be full liberalisation of the quota restrictions.-On the continued U.S. restrictions against Nicaraguan sugar exports and denial of its quota rights, despite a GATT panel ruling, the Nicaraguan complaint was supported by the delegate of the Dominican Republic, speaking on behalf of a group of Latin American countries.-The Dominican delegate cited the recent decision of the SELA Council in this matter, highly critical of the U.S. action and calling for restoration of Nicaraguan quota.-The U.S. delegate, Michael Smith, merely repeated the U.S. position that its actions had been taken "for broader reasons than economic ones", and lifting the restrictions required "solutions to the broader problems".-The Nicaraguan position was supported by Czechoslovakia, Spain, and Norway on behalf of Norway, Finland and Sweden.-On the new U.S. Foreign Sales Corporation Act (FSCA) replacing its previous DISC (Domestic International Sales Corporation) law that a GATT panel had held to be violative of GATT in subsidising exports, the European Community complained the new law raised many questions about its consistency with the General Agreement.-The EEC reiterated its call for the U.S. entering into plurilateral consultations with GATT CPs on this. However, the U.S. declined to go beyond its offer to hold bilateral consultations with the EEC.-Poland brought up its complaint against the U.S. over its denial of most-favoured-nation treatment to polish exports, and said over the last two years Poland had fully complied with its commitments of increased exports from the west. In view of this the U.S. restrictions were untenable and should be lifted.-Here too the U.S. advanced the argument that its actions were within its rights, but said they were now under review in Washington.-