WTO ekes out meager outcomes in overtime Abu Dhabi meeting
By Emma Farge and Rachna Uppal
ABU DHABI (Reuters) -World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiators failed to break a deadlock on major reforms on Friday despite talks extending deep into overtime in Abu Dhabi, in what some delegates said was a triumph of national interest over collective responsibility.
Talks ended early on Saturday after five days of negotiations which failed to see breakthroughs on major negotiating topics like agriculture and fisheries. However, a moratorium on placing tariffs on e-commerce duties was extended by two years, in a relief to businesses.
«On the big ticket items that are essential for the mandate that the WTO wants to sort out, the fisheries, the harmful subsidisation, that just did not happen, because there was not the spirit of give and take,» a senior European official said.
On the fifth day of the ministerial meeting, most ministers had already gone home, although India's Piyush Goyal and European Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis remained.
Goyal was seen smiling and shaking hands outside a meeting room late on Friday as delegates gathered in small groups next to a coffee stand. Goyal met with WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and the meeting's chair, UAE Minister of Foreign Trade Thani Al Zeyoudi, in two separate meetings.
«We have not lost out on anything. I go back happy and satisfied,» Goyal told reporters as talks started to wind down.
WTO spokesperson Ismaila Dieng had earlier said the discussions were «intensive and difficult».
India, along with South Africa, had opposed extending a moratorium on digital trade tariffs — a move that has overwhelming support of most governments and from business, but later relented.
WTO talks have failed before and this year's
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