Bangladesh’s Permanent Representative to the World Trade Organisation in Geneva Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya has sought free decision for LDCs’ market access along with simple and transparent rules of origin. The Dhaka’s envoy was addressing an informal meeting of the Trade Negotiation Committee (TNC) held in Geneva on Thursday.
In the meeting, WTO Director General Pascal Lamy gave a brief of overview of the current status of negotiations and his perception of the future process, according to a message received in Dhaka from Bangladesh’s Permanent Mission in Geneva.
23 delegates from Mexico, Uganda, Brazil, Bangladesh, Chile, Benin, Hong Kong, China, Turkey, Paraguay, Bolivia, Chinese Taipei, EC, Japan, Norway, Indonesia, Costa Rica, USA, Jamaica, Cuba, Nigeria, India, Honduras and Argentina took part in the discussion.
Lamy presided over the discussion.
The Bangladesh representative expressed his delegation’s readiness to give more time to the Chairs to finalise drafts in anticipation of better delivery, he mentioned that LDCs in general and Bangladesh in particular always stressed substance rather than being hostage to mythical deadlines.
The Bangladesh representative expressed his delegation’s readiness to give more time to the Chairs to finalise drafts in anticipation of better delivery, he mentioned that LDCs in general and Bangladesh in particular always stressed substance rather than being hostage to mythical deadlines.
The World Trade Organisation chief also gave a roadmap as to how the negotiations would progress throughout the early part of next year.
In order to produce a credible texts reflecting interests and concerns of all quarters in agriculture and NAMA, he suggested that the Chairs should come up with revised texts at the end of January 2008 so that modalities can be arrived in February 2008.
He reiterated his earlier stand that substance not the artificial deadline should lead the process of on-going DDA negotiations in order to make it more credible.
Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya appreciated Lamy for the objective assessment of the existing scenario and also for the way forward.
