28/07/2022 (Agence Europe) – Members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) agreed on 17 June, after twenty years on a text, to abolish certain subsidies for illegal fishing (see EUROPE 12974/2). According to the Director General, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the agreement should enter into force within a year. “The two to three years we normally have for these agreements to enter into force--we are trying to break that record and have it done in under a year” she said at an event on Thursday 28 July. “Given the critical state of the ocean, there is no time to waste”, she insisted. For the text to enter into force, two-thirds of the members must submit their act of acceptance to the WTO Secretariat. On 25 July, the EU published its decision to support the adoption of this agreement. (LM)