GAZETA MERCANTIL Brasilia, 11/09/01
Brazil has already twice denied a consensus and blocked World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations because of agricultural protectionism in the developed country markets. The risk of Brasilia doing that again today is remote, but it is not being discarded as a possibility to be repeated by other nations at Doha. In 1988, the evaluation of half of the negotiations in the Uruguay Round, held in Montreal, it was Brazil that blocked the decisions, dissatisfied with the lack of advance in the agricultural talks. Two years later, at Brussels, the round could not be concluded for the same reason. In Brussels, then-Brazilian ambassador to the GATT, Rubens Ricupero, went from room to room calling delegates out of the meetings to put an end to the encounter. A curious scene occured when Ricupero entered the room where delegates were discussing the negotiations of services. The Mexican minister said that within the group things were going well, but Ricupero took the initiative to abandon the table. (Gazeta Mercantil - Translated by James Bruce):
