[WTO talks Doha round] Body blow to world poor as World Trade Organisation talks sink

from Christian Aid

Press release

Last night’s failure by rich countries to reach agreement on trade talks strikes a terrible blow at poor people and puts the entire World Trade Organisation in jeopardy.

Christian Aid said that the collapse of the trade talks removed the single most important weapon in the fight against global poverty.

'It seems that the selfish intransigence of the US and Europe has finally wrecked any chance of a successful outcome for these trade talks which were meant to help developing countries,’ said Dr Claire Melamed, Christian Aid’s senior trade analyst.

‘Poor countries desperately needed a fair trade deal so that they could grow out of poverty and not rely on hand outs. This tawdry squabbling at the rich world’s high table has now put paid to that. It is a disgraceful outcome of which leaders of the European Union and America should be ashamed.

‘How they can look themselves in the eye after this no one knows. It is no good flicking a few crumbs of comfort via aid and debt relief front with one hand, while the other is slowly squeezing the economic life-blood out of poor countries,’ she said.

Dr Melamed added that the future of the WTO was now in serious doubt.

‘How can this allegedly great trading organisation continue to function when it cannot perform the basics of what it was designed for?

'This an extremely serious matter and I suspect we are back to the drawing board on trade – with all the damaging consequences that will have for poor countries,’ she said.

Christian Aid was commenting on reports that the latest ‘last-ditch’ bid to resurrect the Doha Development round of talks by the G6 group of nations (America, the EU, Japan, India, Brazil and Australia) has crashed.