Political Quotes

“if I may, the chairman is absolutely correct. I believe it to be the case. You can't obviously say this with complete confidence, but China will become a member of the WTO with us or without us. They have completed their negotiations with the great majority of the 137 members of the WTO. They will be admitted. However, having been admitted, the privileges of the relationship the WTO establishes includes being subject to the rule of law. Panels say what the trade law means. What have you done? What are the facts? Here is the judgment handed down, which can be appealed. It is a rule of law process. That is only available to countries that have met the WTO standard enunciated in Article 1, which says you must have given unconditional normal trade relations. If you have done that with another country, then you can non-apply the WTO to that country (and not gain any of the benefits the other country's concessions) or that country can take you into court--if you would like to put it that way-- and you can answer the decisions and so forth. This is everything you would hope for in a relationship where, up until now, we have had no recourse to binding dispute settlement. When faced with the unwillingness of the Chinese government from time to time to comply with trade agreements, we could do nothing, excepting to complain to them and say: We very much regret you did that. We don't want you to do it again.…”