EU blames US for collapse of Seattle talks By Neil Buckley in Brussels
Pascal Lamy, the European Union's trade commissioner, on Monday blamed the collapse of the Seattle world trade talks on the pressure of looming US presidential elections and suggested the timing and venue of the meeting had been a mistake.
Mr Lamy added that the inability of the World Trade Organisation's decision-making structures to cope with so many members and complex issues had also been a factor in the breakdown. He renewed his call for WTO reform - perhaps including the creation of a WTO parliament.
But, speaking in Brussels on his return from Seattle, Mr Lamy made clear his frustration over the talks' failure, saying the US had been forced to handle them on the basis that it would make no concessions.
He insisted he was not playing a "blame game", but stating facts. "That the election campaign in the US was a problem...that is a fact," he said. "It is not blaming anyone except us, collectively, and the choice that was made to have this in Seattle in December 1999."
"To make concessions in an election campaign is obviously not an easy thing to do, especially in the US."
Mr Lamy also implicitly criticised US President Bill Clinton's call in Seattle for labour standards to be included in trade agreements - and eventually enforced through sanctions.
"I think we all understood that [labour rights]...would not be accepted by developing countries in too aggressive a way - and where, sanctions, in particular, were involved," he said.
The trade commissioner said it was unlikely attempts to launch a new round could get back on track before US presidential elections next November, since the US would have little room for manoeuvre.
He was also downbeat on the prospect for success in talks on agriculture and services to which WTO members were committed.
These did not qualify as a trade "round", he said, but only as sectoral talks, since they had no deadline and the agenda was not broad enough to allow trade-offs. The success record of such sectoral talks was mixed.
The trade commissioner said WTO reform should focus on improving its efficiency and its transparency and accountability. The EU had expertise to offer in the first area, he said, as a cross-border organisation with highly developed decision-making procedures.
The second point meant better explaining the WTO to the public, developing countries and non-governmental organisations - and making it more accountable to elected politicians.
He said proposals from European parliament members for a WTO parliament were "something that deserves consideration".
Mr Lamy added that co-ordination between the WTO and international financial institutions had to be improved to convince developing countries that their interests were being taken seriously. One possibility was creating a global "economic security council" - an idea of Jacques Delors, the former European Commission president and Mr Lamy's former boss.