AP Worldstream | By: NAOMI KOPPEL GENEVA, World Trade Organization ambassadors met Wednesday for the last time before a key conference, resigned to being unable to agree in advance on launching a new round of trade liberalization talks.
"The climate is not really that much different from the climate before Seattle," said Federico Cuello Camilo, ambassador of the Dominican Republic, referring to the WTO's failure to launch a round during its last meeting of trade ministers in 1999.
The chairman of the ruling General Council, Hong Kong Ambassador Stuart Harbinson, completed consultations with delegations last week and produced new drafts of three declarations to be made by ministers at the meeting, which opens Nov. 9 in Doha, Qatar. Ambassadors had originally planned to approve the drafts before the meeting, but it became clear that they were unable to agree.
Envoys meeting Wednesday at the last scheduled meeting of the general council before Doha said they did not plan to discuss the text formally any more.
Harbinson will pass the documents to Doha on his own initiative without general council approval, and members of the 142-nation WTO will continue informal discussions to see if they can break the deadlock by the time they get to Qatar.
"The chairman says he has made his best effort to find a middle point that satisfies all delegations, but still there is a lot of grumbling from all delegations," Cuello said.
At the 1999 meeting in Seattle, trade ministers faced a document of more than 30 pages containing alternative wording for many of the issues under discussion. They found it impossible to settle all the differences in four days and the meeting collapsed without agreement.
Since then, ministers have insisted that they would refuse to go to a meeting unless they are assured of success in advance, yet diplomats now accept that they will still have work to do in Doha.
"I don't think anybody is fully happy, but I think it is a good basis for further discussion," said Canadian Ambassador Sergio Marchi.
Cuello said he thought the "deal-breaker" could turn out to be differences over the interpretation of the WTO's agreement on intellectual property - known by the acronym TRIPS - as it relates to patented medicines used to treat HIV/AIDS and other illnesses.
The WTO is planning a separate ministerial declaration on the issue, and developing countries insist on the wording: "Nothing in the TRIPS Agreement shall prevent members from taking measures to protect public health."
This is rejected by the United States and Switzerland - both major producers of pharmaceuticals. They claim that the TRIPS agreement already has provisions that would allow members to act in the event of a public health crisis, and there is no need to go beyond it.
"From here on delegations will start to consult to see what alternatives can be found," said Cuello.
Other major issues still dividing WTO members include the scope of talks on agriculture, leniency in implementing agreements for developing countries and whether new rules should be agreed on countries' competition and investment policies.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick on Tuesday accused Japan of obstructing talks to launch the round by refusing to give way on agricultural subsidies.AP Worldstream:
