WTO HEAD CONFIDENT U.S.A. WILL COME RIGHT

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Director general tells Caribbean leaders that US will eventually implement WTO rulings on online gambling

The Antigua Sun reports that a top official in the World Trade Organisation, Director General Pascal Lamy is confident that the United States will eventually comply with the WTO's ruling on its online gambling discriminatory practices.

The newspaper reports that Lamy was speaking to a closed session of a meeting with CARICOM Ministers of Trade, and that he observed that the preservation of the rules-based multilateral trading system on which the WTO is based ensures that, over time, the US will move to implement the rulings and recommendations of the WTO Dispute Settlement Body.

Antigua and Barbuda's Minister of Finance and the Economy, Dr Errol Cort, had asked Lamy how the WTO intends to ensure that the rights of its smallest members are treated in the same manner as its largest. Lamy said that it is in the best interest of the major trading nations of the world to ensure that the organs of the WTO are seen as fully functional and, in the case of its Dispute Settlement system, that its rulings and recommendations are respected and fully implemented.

Lamy also noted that, in his view the US has unfailingly implemented the rulings and recommendations of the DSB in all instances, even in those cases where such rulings have gone against it.

Dr Cort commented on the forthcoming proposal to repeal the UIGEA by Congressman Barney Frank, saying: “We will be keeping a close watch on developments surrounding the anticipated introduction of the Frank Bill, on which we anticipate that there will be no major progress in the near term."

“However, my government is of the view that it is a step in the right direction, given that the current law has had a deleterious effect on online gaming everywhere to the point where the European Union's internal market chief, Charlie McCreevy, has hinted that he may challenge the ban at the WTO."