Legal details of China, PNTR & WTO

Stephen E Philion philion at hawaii.edu
Wed Mar 15 10:35:45 PST 2000


So, where are they with Mexico? Indonesia? Brazil?...Yet we don't have any big problem with their being in the WTO...

China ain't no workers paradise or workers' state, but let's face it, teh AFL-CIO is gonna lose this battle. Then what? After the ineffective strategy of opposing China's entry into WTO (but opposing WTO of course, god forbid we oppose that as a strategy)..., will a strategy that works be considered?

Steve

On Wed, 15 Mar 2000, Tom Lehman wrote:


> Mike--The WTO/China deal shifts power from the Congress to the Executive
> Branch and makes trade relations with China an administrative process.
>
> Ian posted some of the recently released details of the US/China WTO/PNTR
> agreement. Where are the workers rights-human rights clauses and conditions?
> Where are the safety, health and environmental clauses and conditions?
>
> They don't exist.
>
> Tom
>
> Michael Pollak wrote:
>
> > I'm a bit confused. Even if the opponents of Permanent Normal Trade
> > Relations with China won, how would that change anything? Presumably
> > China would still be approved on an annual basis for this year. Once it
> > finishes its negotiations with other WTO members (meaning essentially the
> > EU), it would then apply for membership, which would be automatic. So
> > blocking PNTR wouldn't stop China's accession. And once it was a member,
> > revoking NTR on an annual basis would become a WTO violation, just as it
> > would if we acted unilaterally against any other WTO member.
> >
> > Up until now I thought perhaps the US/China trade agreement was
> > conditional on the US granting PTNR. But yesterday, Shi Guangsheng,
> > China's equivalent of Charlene Barkshefsky, said that even if the US voted
> > down PNTR, China would still apply for WTO membership this year. So
> > what's the point and why are people acting like it's a big deal?
> >
> > Michael
> >
> > __________________________________________________________________________
> > Michael Pollak................New York City..............mpollak at panix.com
>
>



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