1st LD Writethru: EU, China urge appointment of WTO appellate body members

0 Comment(s)Print E-mail Xinhua, December 13, 2018
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GENEVA, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- The European Union (EU), China and other World Trade Organization (WTO) members on Wednesday delivered a joint statement, emphasizing the urgent need to unblock the appointment of WTO Appellate Body members.

At a meeting of the WTO General Council, those members, including the EU, China, Canada, Norway, New Zealand, Switzerland, Australia, Republic of Korea, Iceland, Singapore and Mexico, voiced their deep concern that "continued vacancies in the Appellate Body present a risk to the WTO as a whole."

While reaffirming their commitment to the rules-based multilateral trading system, they underscored the dispute settlement system as a central pillar of the WTO.

"Such a system is also essential in building confidence amongst members in the negotiating pillar," said the statement.

The members took note of the concerns about the functioning of the dispute settlement system, saying that they are "ready to work on solutions, while preserving the essential features of the system and of its Appellate Body."

Underlining their commitment to engaging in discussions on "substantive rules" of the Appellate Body, they called on interested members to advance ideas on how to take this process forward.

The joint statement was released as previously planned after members including the EU, China and India submitted two joint proposals on reforming the WTO dispute settlement mechanism on Nov. 22. The two proposals were presented at the Wednesday meeting of General Council.

The first proposal offers proper solutions to transitional rules of outgoing Appellate Body members and the second aims to strengthen the independence of the Appellate Body, to increase its efficiency and capability as well as to enable an automatic start of its selection process.

However, the proposals are rejected by the United States, which estimated that "the proposals would not effectively address the concerns that members have raised."

The Appellate Body functions as the global trade body's de facto court of appeals and is composed of seven members. However, only three of the seven members are in office since Washington has refused to initiate the process to fill vacancies.

At a press conference after Wednesday's meeting, WTO spokesperson Keith Rockwell reiterated that the mandate of two of three members of the Appellate Body would be expired at the end of next year. If the appointment process remains blocked, "we will no longer have enough jurists to hear appeals," he warned.

"In essence, there is a degree of paralysis of the dispute settlement system," said the spokesperson.

Meanwhile, he noted some positive signs in Wednesday's meeting, revealing that Chairman of the General Council, Junichi Ihara, announced his intention to launch an informal process to open discussions on resolving the crisis.

"A willingness was expressed by all members to engage in deeper discussions," he added. Enditem

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