UPA shouldn’t fall prey to US pressure at WTO : CPM

The CPM claimed that a ‘glaringly iniquitous’ draft agreement was being forced on developing countries at the WTO talks.

The CPM on Monday claimed that a ‘glaringly iniquitous’ draft agreement was being forced on developing countries at the WTO talks in Geneva and asked the UPA government not to fall prey to US ‘pressure’ on the issue.

“The US is exerting pressure upon India to fall in line and facilitate the adoption of an iniquitous agreement. The US President George Bush has called up the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in this connection.”

“The UPA government should not compromise India’s stand at the WTO talks in Geneva. Capitulation to US pressure would amount to another betrayal of national interests,” the CPM Politburo said in a statement in New Delhi.

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The party said efforts were being made by developed nations led by the US “to force an agreement in the WTO talks, which will be inimical to the interests of the developing countries.”

The latest draft released by the WTO Director General on July 25, the Politburo said, reflected “glaring inequities in agriculture and NAMA.”

Maintaining that developed nations like the US and those in the European Union would be able to retain much of their “huge subsidies” on agricultural sector, it said the developing countries “would be forced to undertake steep cuts in agricultural and industrial tariffs.”

The provisions to protect agriculture in developing countries through designation of Special Products and Special Safeguards Mechanism “have been diluted to such an extent that they are rendered meaningless.”

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“Such an outcome would make a mockery of the ‘development’ dimension of the Doha Round,” the CPM said.

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