The Washington Trade Daily (WTD) reports that the free trade negotiations that began with Bahrain in January 2004 are nearly half completed, with an negotiations possibly being completed as early as June. The WTD states that the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) believes Kuwait, Yemen, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) could possibly dock into this agreement. (WTD Pub 03/04/04, www.washingtontradedaily.com)
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) has issued a notice requesting written comments by April 16, 2004 concerning the European Communities' (EC's) request for the establishment of a World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute settlement panel (DSP) regarding offsets to calculated dumping margins for instances of non-dumping.
The Washington Trade Daily (WTD) has reported that the Senate began debate on March 3, 2004 to repeal the current Foreign Sales Corporation/Extraterritorial Income Tax Exclusion (FSC/ETI) regime. According to Senate Finance Committee Chairman, Sen. Grassley, the FSC/ETI could be replaced with the Jumpstart Our Business Strength Act (JOBS Act) which would use all of the money from the repeal to provide a 3 point tax rate cut on income from U.S.-based manufacturing. (WTD Pub 03/04/04, www.washingtontradedaily.com, Sen. Grassley's press release dated 03/02/04, available at http://finance.senate.gov/press/Gpress/2004/prg030204.pdf)
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) has posted to its Web site the draft text of the U.S.-Australia Free Trade Agreement (AFTA), which is dated March 1, 2004.
The International Trade Administration (ITA) frequently issues notices on antidumping (AD) and countervailing (CV) duty orders which Broker Power considers to be "minor" in importance as they concern actions that occur after an order is issued and neither announce nor cause any changes to an order's duty rates, scope, affected firms, or effective period.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) has issued a press release announcing that on March 2, 2004, the U.S. and Morocco reached agreement on a comprehensive free trade agreement (FTA).
President Bush has issued Proclamation 7758 in order to delete ten countries from, and add one country to, the list of Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) beneficiary developing countries.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) has issued a notice announcing that the U.S. intends to initiate free trade negotiations with Thailand. (See ITT's Online Archives or 02/18/04 news, 04021820, for BP summary of USTR's press release announcing its Congressional notification of this intention.)
On February 24, 2004, World Trade Organization (WTO) arbitrators decided that the European Union (EU) has no current right to retaliate against the U.S.' Antidumping Act of 1916 (1916 Act). However, the arbitrators did allow for the EU to retaliate if final judgments or settlements are made under the 1916 Act in the future.
In December 2003, the U.S. concluded negotiations with El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua on a comprehensive U.S.-Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). In January 2004, the U.S. concluded its CAFTA negotiations with Costa Rica.