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Negotiations within Doha Round Becomes Reason for Delay of 5th Meeting of Azerbaijan with WTO

Business Materials 26 February 2008 17:15 (UTC +04:00)

Azerbaijan, Baku, 26 February / Trend corr. I.Khalilova / World Trade Organization (WTO) postpones the meeting with the candidate-countries to join WTO, due to positive tendency in Doha round of negotiations which caused delay of the fifth round of negotiations of the Azerbaijani Government with the Task Group, Mahmud Mammadkuliyev, the deputy Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan, stated.

WTO member-country Trade Ministers will hold meeting in Geneva in March to secure the results of negotiations within the framework of Doha round on liberalization and remove of gaps in trade sphere and soft tariff policy. For this reason, as well as additional responds on the proposal of Azerbaijan the meeting with the Organization Task Group will be held in April or May.

"WTO Secretariat asked for technical specifications both for responds on questions and proposals on tariffs and services," Mammadkuliyev added.

Mammadkuliyev believes that WTO demands have been toughen every year. Therefore, Azerbaijan should accelerate the process and taken into consideration the interest of the country. Azerbaijan tries to join WTO as developing country.

Azerbaijan has to stand for its interests before such WTO member-countries like the US and EU. EU being one of the largest agricultural exporters in world proposes to decrease rates suggested to Azerbaijan. Today, the import custom rate 15% is imposed on the final product and 0 or .05% - raw material.

The correspondent can be contacted at: [email protected]

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