MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Controversy over free trade agreements

United States Democrat Congress members are strongly lobbying against the approval of bilateral free trade agreements with Chile and Singapore currently being discussed in Capitol Hill.

"The North America Free Trade Agreement, Nafta, signed ten years ago with Mexico and Canada has been a total failure with ominous consequences for the US, and must be taken as an example to vote against similar agreements with Chile and Singapore" underlined US Congress member Raúl Grijalba during a press conference in Washington.

"Before we rush to approve the current agreements, it would be rather wise to examine Nafta and confirm that none of the promises became effective", said Mr. Grijalba.

What most concerns US Congress members is the export overseas of jobs by US corporations that take advantage of cheaper wages and less demanding environment protection legislation.

"Free trade agreements mean fewer jobs in our districts", highlighted US Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur who detailed how thousands of jobs in her area were lost to Mexico, China and India among others.

"US workers are well aware that hundreds of thousands of jobs have been lost in the ten years of Nafta; then came China, and now again the promise that these agreements will create thousands of jobs. But US workers know it's all nonsense and rather the opposite with US industrial jobs exported to low salary countries such as Mexico and China", blasted Congress member Sherrod Brown.

Democrats allege that since president Bush took office 2,19 million jobs have been lost in the US.

Congresswoman Kaptur explained that with each free trade agreement, US trade deficit has consistently grown and this year is estimated in 500 billion US dollars.

In the mid eighties US-China trade was balanced but since the bilateral agreement it has consistently increased and this year is expected to reach 103 billion US dollars. Similarly with Mexico, from a 1,7 billion US dollars surplus before Nafta, ten years later it has become an annual 25 billion US dollars deficit.

The Democrat Congress members also pointed out that if the Chile and Singapore agreements are finally approved they will be used "as models for the current negotiations with Central America and the Free Trade Association of the Americas involving 34 countries of the three Americas".

US trade unions and environmentalist groups openly support the Democrats in rejecting free trade agreements.