By C. Rammanohar Reddy appeared in "The Hindu" on November 28. 1999

NEW DELHI: On the eve of next week's ministerial meeting in Seattle of the World Trade Organisation, the Union Minister for Commerce and Industry, Mr. Murasoli Maran, spoke to The Hindu on India's preparation for the talks, the position it will take and related issues.

Question: Is the Government confident that the negotiating agenda to be decided at Seattle will reflect India's interests?

Mr. Murasoli Maran: It will be our endeavour to see that India's interests are duly reflected in the negotiating agenda. It is, however, difficult to say at this stage how many of our proposals will be accepted in the final Ministerial Declaration as negotiations are always a matter of give and take.

While we will be flexible, our flexibility at Seattle will depend on how receptive the meeting is to the issues of interest to us. There will be no quid-pro-quo which is not in the national interests. That will be the touchstone. Our aim at the meeting will be to maximise our gains and the losses, if any, will be minimised.

The main issues that India has raised in the preparatory process are on implementation of the existing agreements. A number of developing countries share our views but the U.S. and the European Union have so far refused to seriously address these concerns. Do you think the unity of the developing countries will hold?

We have two ``wish lists'' on implementation - one for redressal at Seattle itself of problems in existing agreements and another which has to be addressed in a fast-track process. So far the U.S. and E.U. appear to be opposed to these demands, but we must see what happens in Seattle. We have not been alone in raising these issues, a number of like-minded developing countries share our concerns. We must see if the present unity will hold, but I expect it to continue at Seattle.

The history of GATT/WTO talks is that at the last minute, political pressure is exerted on the developing countries and an agenda of interest to the rich countries is pushed through. An additional factor now is that the developing countries have differing interests.

It is true that the interests of the WTO countries, including the developing nations, are now more varied and do not reflect a clear polarisation of views. While some may see this as a drawback, it could also be seen as an opportunity for building coalitions of support on individual or a cluster of issues on the basis of common interests.

Since the U.S. has high stakes in this meeting and it wants it to be a success, has it offered anything in other areas (sanctions, nuclear weapons, etc) in exchange for India's willingness to go along with it on trade issues at Seattle? And at the WTO are we now closer to the U.S. than to the E.U.?

The two cannot be mixed up. Nuclear matters are outside trade and at Seattle it will be only trade on the agenda. And so far there has been no talk of that kind.

In some matters we are closer to the U.S. but in some others we are opposed to them. So at Seattle it will be an issue- based alliance between countries.

The U.S. wants the meeting to take some decisions on the so- called links between trade and environment, trade and labour.

It is an election year in the U.S., so they are raising these issues. But we are firmly opposed to these matters. We can't be flexible in issues of vital national interest to us.

Seattle is going to be a critical meeting where a negotiating agenda is going to be decided.

I should clarify a number of things. Firstly, we will not be writing on a clean slate at Seattle. Many of the issues that will be discussed there will be in continuation of decisions taken at previous ministerial meetings at Marrakesh in 1994, Singapore in 1996 and Geneva in 1998. Second, a lot of hype has been generated about the meeting. At Seattle we will be negotiating only the negotiating agenda. We will of course be very careful in agreeing to the future agenda. And after the agenda is set the negotiations will go on for some years. We can always take any portion out later during those talks. Third, there is a general feeling that we are against a new round - a Millennium Round or whatever. We are only opposed to a very comprehensive round in which all manner of non-trade issues will be placed on the agenda. And all ministerial meetings end in decisions to launch a new round of talks in one form or the other.

Is India adequately prepared for the Seattle meeting?

We have consulted a number of stakeholders - business associations, labour leaders and political parties. We have taken everybody's views into account in formulating our position. I have told the political parties that the negotiations are like a two-way street. There will be trade-offs but not at the cost of national interests.