Brussels, 30/01/2003 (Agence Europe) - With the failure of bilateral consultations and the European veto against its first request in Geneva last year, India finally secured this week that the World Trade Organisation (WTO) rule on the legality of the tariff preferences the EU reserves for certain developing countries, "taken at random", depending on criteria it itself sets, in the framework of its Generalised System of Preferences (GSP). A dozen or so countries have expressed the desire to intervene in this arbitration procedure, before the panel that will soon be set up, either to defend the European policy, or to support the challenge launched by New Delhi, including the United States, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Cuba and Sri Lanka.
In the request it submitted in Geneva, initially in December 2002, India argues that "tariff preferences granted under certain conditions (commitment to combat drugs, respect of certain social and environmental standards: Ed.) are incompatible with the 1994 GATT rules (Article 1: 1) and do not meet the requirements" of differentiated and more favourable treatment, reciprocity of concessions and full participation of developing countries that are set out in the treaty's "enabling clause". Indeed, the Indian side points out, the GSP may be an exception to the Most Favoured Nation clause (under the "enabling clause") if it induces discrimination in favour of developing countries, but here it is not the case, given the conditions the Europeans impose on them to benefit from the scheme. Imposition of such conditions, that have no relation with the objective of such an exemption (trade facilitation and promotion) is a breach of the obligation of treatment as Most Favoured Nation clause and the "enabling clause", explained the Indian delegate to the WTO Dispute Settlement Body. His European counterpart replied, recalling that the GSP was an autonomous scheme deployed without discrimination, without demanding reciprocity and on a generalised basis, whence its total compatibility with European commitments to the WTO, including with the requirements of the "enabling clause". On the other hand, the "incentives" provided by the special "drugs", "social" of "environmental" standards merely comply with the goals the international community has set itself to make sustainable development a reality, he further recalled.