Bush calls up Manmohan, seeks headway in N-deal, WTO talks

The two leaders also touched upon the stalled World Trade Organization (WTO) talks and discussed the need for leading trading countries to contribute to a breakthrough in the Doha Round.

Earlier, in the meeting of trade ministers from Group of Seven members — the US, the EU, Japan, India, Brazil, Australia and China — the US and the EU mounted pressure on India to agree for diluted flexibilities on special products (SPs) and special safeguard mechanism (SSM) and the anti-concentration provision and sectoral tariff elimination in the Doha non-agricultural market access (Nama).

Apparently, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath told World Trade Organization director general Pascal Lamy that if the flexibilities for SPs and SSM are to be diluted, especially on the issue zero duty for at least 5 per cent of farm tariff lines and the appropriate triggers and remedies for SSM, he would walk out of the meeting, Business Standard was told.

India rejected the US' demands on sectoral tariff elimination and also opposed the EU's demand on anti-concentration during the meeting. Later, Nath held a confessional meeting with Lamy in which the WTO chief probed about India's bottomlines, trade sources said.

The commerce minister told reporters that he will oppose every attempts to dilute the SSM provisions. He said India had already paid several times in the Nama framework agreement that was agreed in 2004, suggesting that there is nothing to pay more.

Meanwhile, industry chambers FICCI and the CII, along with the Union Industrial Argentina (UIA), Business Unity South Africa called on developing countries to oppose several provisions in the latest Nama draft text, especially anti-concentration, sectorals, and the non-tariff barrier proposal on trade in remanufactured goods.

These four industry lobbies said there should be a difference of 25 points between the coefficients of industrialised countries and developing nations.

Meanwhile, Brazil and India continued their defence of the figures for the coefficients and flexibilities based on the principle of less-than-full reciprocity, which was rejected by the four industrialised G-7 members.