Working Party Chairman Sees Good Progress in China's WTO AccessionThe Working Party on the Accession of China to the World Trade Organization (WTO) has made good progress in its consideration of a revised draft protocol, Chairman Pierre-Louis Girard said here Thursday."Positions were narrowed significantly on a number of points, with emerging consensus developing in some important areas," Girard said in his summing up at the end of the week-long meeting of the working party. "With certain additional clarifications, it should be possible to table a further draft of the protocol for consideration in the next round of working party discussions," the Swiss ambassador said. He described the current session of the working party as " productive and business-like." In his statement at Thursday's meeting, China's Vice Minister for Foreign Trade Long Yongtu said that China's WTO accession negotiations are making steady progress in both bilateral and multilateral aspects. In respect of bilateral negotiations, China has signed bilateral agreements with Ecuador and Guatemala this week and has concluded negotiations with Costa Rica, shortening the long list of its negotiating partners to only two WTO members, namely Mexico and Switzerland. Long expressed the hope that all bilateral WTO negotiations would be concluded in the near future through concerted efforts of the concerned parties. During the current session, another step forward has been made in China's multilateral negotiations on the drafting of the multilateral legal documents for China's accession on the basis of the progress of the recent sessions and the 10th session in particular. "China and working party members have reached consensus on many provisions of the protocol and the drafting of the working party report has also entered into the stage of substantive discussions, " said Long. The head of the Chinese delegation said that his delegation is looking forward to more progress in the next session of the working party, which is scheduled in mid-September. |
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