By Daisy Ayliffe - 9th April 2006
US suggestions that Washington should “divorce” Brussels in world trade talks are “offensive,” EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson declared on Monday.
Bill Thomas chairman of the US house ways and means committee, said the US should “divorce'' the EU to stop it “dragging down the global trade talks” in an article in the FT on Monday.
“Thomas's offensive language is unwelcome and untimely,'' Mandelson hit back at a press briefing in Luxembourg.
Speaking after updating European foreign ministers on the state of the troubled Doha round, Mandelson said bilateral agreements would come at the expense of the multilateral trade round.
“In these WTO talks, no player is more wedded to one player than any other.''
US President George Bush's negotiating authority from congress will expire next year and Thomas accused key WTO members of being “locked into their inward-looking positions.''
“We have been sitting next to the EU for a long time and the conversation has been painful. Until the EU is serious about true liberalization, we should get up from that seat and visit with others at the dinner table to have more fruitful discussions,” he insisted.
Mandelson said Thomas's position amounted to a US “retreat" from the WTO talks.
“The issue is for all major players to exercise leadership in this round rather than sounding the retreat."
WTO update
Mandelson was in Luxembourg to “brief constituents” on the state of the ongoing world trade round.
But less than three weeks before the WTO's 149 members are supposed to agree on farm and industrial goods there is still little sign of a breakthrough.
The British commissioner said too many deadlines had already been missed and called on all players to give more.
"The EU believes it would be wrong to let up pressure on that deadline. I believe everyone should redouble efforts to meet the end of April deadline and the EU is certainly committed to doing that."
But he reiterated that Europe's partners in the talks were either asking too much or offering too little to justify more flexibility.
"The EU wants ambition for this round but there needs to be a similar level of ambition across the board," he said.
France, who has previously criticised Mandelson over his agriculture offer, repeated it would accept no more concessions.
"We consider it would be a risk (for the EU) to go beyond the offer made by the commission," French European affairs minister Catherine Colonna was quoted as saying.
Lamy intervention
In an article in French daily Les Echos on Monday, head of the WTO Pascal Lamy said there was still a long way to go.
“Even if the gap between offers and demands of the key players has been narrowed, it still remains wide.”
“Part of the misunderstandings comes from this middle aged belief that Europe is protected by strong barriers and that if we touch them everything collapses. Europe’s strategic interest is to be more offensive,” he added.
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