BEIJING, March 10 (AFP) - China confidently predicted it was close to ending its long quest for WTO membership Friday as it sealed a trade pact with Thailand and prepared for a final round of tough talks with the EU.
"It won't be long before China's entry into the World Trade Organization," said Chinese Minister of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation Shi Guangsheng as he signed the Thai trade deal.
Shi said EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy would arrive on March 27 for a final push for a deal with the European Union, by far the largest of China's trade partners yet to agree to the bilateral accords necessary for WTO entry.
"After the two sessions of talks we had in Brussels and Beijing I think we have to say that important progress has been made," Shi said.
"Now the differences are narrowing through negotiations and I am full of confidence that when Mr Lamy comes to Beijing we can find a way that both sides can accept," he said.
A European Commission spokesman announced Lamy's visit on Thursday.
Lamy "intends to go to China to address the political issues outstanding in negotiations with China on accession to the WTO," said the spokesman.
"We are going in hopes we can finalize a bilateral deal that would open the way for China to enter into the WTO at the earliest opportunity, which has been our position from the beginning," he said.
The spokesman declined to specify which political issues Lamy would discuss with the Chinese, saying only that they were "issues that should be negotiated at Mr Lamy's level."
The last round of Sino-EU trade talks broke up last month with China refusing to bow to EU demands that it allow European telecom companies to take more than 50 percent stakes in joint ventures.
A European source close to the talks said the negotiators refused to discuss a range of other tricky issues, including access to the insurance and securities market, and predicted hard bargaining ahead.
"The negotiations really broke down on telecoms and went no further, but the EU side was using the issue of telecoms to try to get concessions in other areas," the source told AFP.
China had been expecting to wrap up a market-opening deal very quickly in the wake of the landmark Sino-US deal agreed in November and has been surprised at the tough negotiating stance of the EU.
"Our expectations and our needs are different because the European Union is over 15 member states and each member state has its own requirements," said Luciano Bay, chairman of the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Beijing.
Visiting Thai Deputy Prime Minister Supachai Panitchpakdi signed the bilateral agreement on Friday and also predicted China would enter the global trading body soon, ending its 14-year bid for membership.
Supachai is scheduled to take over from Mike Moore as WTO director general in 2002, as part of a deal that resolved a long and bitter leadership race which carved deep divides in the world trade body.
"The agreement we just signed is testimony not only to our long-standing relationship but it signals the emergence of China's economy as part of the world economy," said Supachai.
The accord reduces to 11 the number of countries or trading blocs with which China has yet to conclude negotiations on WTO entry.
"It has become quite clear China is making headway in completing agreements with all the interested parties before a new round of multilateral trade negotiations can be launched," Supachai said.
"It is indeed significant that China might become a member before a new round is launched," he said.
Ministers from WTO member nations meeting in Seattle in December failed to agree on an agenda for a new cycle of trade liberalization talks, and little progress toward a new round has been made since.
As well as the EU, China still has to agree bilateral trade deals with Argentina, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland and Switzerland.:
