Chinese senior legislator briefs Jakarta meeting on WTO talks
2006-01-18
Xinhua
A Chinese senior legislator was present at the Asia-Pacific Parliamentary Forum here Tuesday to brief participants the results of the World Trade Organization's recent meeting in Hong Kong.
During the WTO ministerial conference on December 13-18, 2005, a ministerial declaration was adopted with a number of agreements in the area of trade in agricultural products, non-agricultural market access, trade in services and development, said Wang Yingfan, member of the standing committee of the Chinese National People's Congress.
Under the agreements, "all WTO members must eliminate all forms of agricultural export subsidies by the end of 2013," said Wang.
Members also agreed that developed members must grant duty-free and quota-free access to least-developed members on products accounting for 97 percent of tariff lines in 2008, he said.
But Wang reminded that despite the achievements made at the Hong Kong conference, serious divisions still remain among the members.
Also present on Tuesday's session were representative from South Korea, who briefed participants about the recent meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), and legislator from Malaysia who reported the first East Asia Summit in Kuala Lumpur.
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