WTO plans meeting of trade ministers in Qatar (03/1/2000)
World Trade Organisation (WTO) Deputy Director General Ablasseh Wedraogo said in Cairo on Tuesday the organisation is planning a meeting of trade ministers in Doha, the Egyptian MENA news agency reported.
Awadrago said consultations with WTO member states were underway to convene the meeting in the wake of last year's failed Seattle summit and this month's UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in Bangkok.
The deputy chief, heading a WTO delegation to a Cairo conference of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), gave no date for the meeting in capital of Qatar.
WTO chief Michael Moore said earlier this month that a new round of global trade talks could not be opened until ministers showed more flexibility, even though the wounds had started to heal after the WTO summit in Seattle.
"Ministers are not going to a ministerial conference unless there is a large measure of agreement before we get there," he said. "Not a chance."