www.agp.org | Archives - WTO info: EU risks missing 31 March services deadline!

Brussels, 26/03/2003 (Agence Europe) - While negotiations on agriculture remain deadlocked, five days before the deadline set for an agreement on the modalities for future reform, the EU seems to be preparing to miss the venue on 31 March, that the 145 member countries of the WTO also set, for the presentation of their offers on opening the services market. "We would like not to over-dramatise the buffer dates and place emphasis on the attraction of the package", it was said in Brussels on Wednesday, hinting that the European offer - which is highly mediatised and questioned by the NGOs - could be awaited several more weeks. At this stage of intra-Community consultation, the European Commission has not yet identified the "pockets of resistance" within the Council, given the many misunderstandings that it first of all had to dispel, mainly the extrapolations made by some on the sensitive area of immigration from the "interesting" response that it is proposing to make to developing countries in order to host qualified workers (interpreters, computer specialists, etc.) for specific and temporary contracts. "This has nothing to do with immigration - considerable explanation was needed", it is stressed at the Commission. Consultation should not cover the heart of the subject until Friday at the level of Council committee 1334 and could be prolonged, "if necessary", until the Council on 14 April. But already on Friday, "we shall have a clearer picture", the same source says.