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WTO chief formally recommends suspension of Doha Round talks
GENEVA, July 24 (Xinhua) -- World Trade Organization (WTO) chief Pascal Lamy formally recommended on Monday the suspension of the Doha Round of global free trade talks, after a meeting of six key trading powers collapsed.
"Faced with this persistent impasse, I believe the only course of action I can recommend is to suspend the negotiations across the Round as a whole," Lamy told an informal conference of the Trade Negotiations Committee, which comprises all the 149 WTO members.
That means all work in all negotiating groups should now be suspended, and the same applies to the deadlines that various groups were facing, he later told reporters at a press conference.
The WTO chief said that negotiators clearly need serious reflection. "Time-out to review the situation, examine available options and review positions."
U.S. blames "other allies" for suspension of WTO talks
WASHINGTON, July 24 (Xinhua) -- White House spokesman Tony Snow blamed unnamed "other allies" on Monday for the suspension of global trade talks and said that the U.S. government is still willing to be flexible on the talks.
"It would be wrong to say that they have collapsed, but what they have been is suspended," the White House spokesman said when asked about the suspension of the Doha Round of World Trade Organization (WTO) talks.
"The United States was willing to make concessions at the table if some of our other allies wished to do so. They did not," he said. "We're still willing to be flexible."
"But on the other hand, the stuff that was on the table at Doha would never have been approved by Congress," Snow said.
He said that the U.S. government's chief trade negotiators will continue "to try to achieve the objectives of the Doha round" in the coming weeks.
The WTO's Doha Round of global trade talks was suspended on Monday after key players in the World Trade Organization failed again to reach a consensus on agriculture and industrial trade. Enditem
