WTO ministers end talks with no breakthrough on Doha Round
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Trade ministers of the World Trade Organization (WTO) members wrapped up a three-day conference on Wednesday with no breakthrough on the long-stalled Doha Round.
"Ministers reaffirmed the need to conclude the (Doha) Round in 2010 and for a stock-taking exercise to take place in the first quarter of next year," Chilean Finance Minister Andres Velasco, who chaired the conference, said in a summary.
The ministerial conference, which is the WTO's highest decision-making body, took place as the global trade is in its worst contraction since the 1930s this year, due to the financial and economic crisis.
Ministers were asked to have a wide-ranging review of the WTO's whole activity and reflect on how to boost trade in stimulating economic recovery.
"There was strong convergence on the importance of trade and the Doha Round to economic recovery and poverty alleviation in developing countries," Velasco said.
Although WTO Director-general Pascal Lamy said ahead of the conference that it was not a negotiation session for the Doha Round, the deadlocked trade negotiations remained the focus.
Launched in 2001 as a development round, the Doha Round has been deadlocked in the past eight years due to differences between developed and developing countries over access to agricultural and non-agricultural markets.
Political leaders now aim to finish the negotiations by 2010, though several previous deadlines had been missed.
Despite repeating an uninsured deadline and planning to hold a further assessment meeting at an unknown level, the ministers remained divided on substantial issues, with hard bargaining lying ahead.
"Gaps remain on substance and there was wide acknowledgment of the need for leadership and engagement on the remaining specific issues over the coming weeks," Velasco said.
Lamy said it was undecided which level of meeting would be held to do the stock-taking exercise by March, warning it would be the last moment for a breakthrough if a deal can be reached by the end of next year.
But he acknowledged the current negotiations went too slowly.
"For the moment, my sense of the pace of the negotiations is that at this pace, concluding in 2010 will be a challenge. That's the reason to accelerate," he said.
At the conference, the United States came under fire for its lack of leadership and incentive to move the Doha Round forward.
"We hope that the United States will demonstrate leadership in the coming months," Indian Minister for Commerce and Industry Anand Sharma said.
The U.S. administration under President Barack Obama was criticized for being unenthusiastic about the Doha Round since it is preoccupied with other issues, such as domestic health reform and the war in Afghanistan, and it fears domestic pressure as unemployment is on the rise.
U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk on Wednesday repeated a tough position by pressing emerging economies to make more concessions, saying their meaningful market opening is needed for a deal on the Doha Round.
"The question now is the willingness of our partners to engage in a meaningful way," Kirk said. "We believe now is the time to act on those commitments and move outside our comfort zones and make the hard necessary choices required."
But Brazil's Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said developing countries would not offer more, and India's Sharma also urged developed countries to temper their demands.
