MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Democrat-Congress and White House reach deal on world trade

United States Democratic-controlled Congress wrestled major trade concessions from the Republican administration to make international labor and environment standards binding for US free-trade agreements.

Hailed as a historic bipartisan agreement, the deal was announced by representatives of both the Congressional majority and the Republican administration. It will apply to deals already negotiated with Peru, Panama, Colombia and South Korea but is not expected to slow their passage, officials said. "This agreement recognizes that many people have lost their jobs because of globalization," said house speaker Nancy Pelosi. "We must do much more to address consequences of globalization and how many working families are faced with increased economic security, so we have some basic principles." US Trade Representative Susan C. Schwab, faced with mounting opposition in Congress to the pending deals, directly negotiated with the Democrats, who took over Congress in January, to iron out last-minute hitches, the Washington Post reported earlier Thursday. Susan Schwab called it a "historic" bipartisan breakthrough that would help advance President George Bush administration's trade agenda. "Our farmers, our ranchers, our workers, our service providers, our businesses all understand that 95% of the world's consumers or the world's customers are outside of our border," she said on Capitol Hill. The move comes as World Trade Organization (WTO) talks - specifically, the current Doha round - are stalled on basic issues such as subsidies paid by wealthier nations to their own farmers, which make agricultural exports from developing countries less competitive in international markets. Poorer countries, on the other hand, are reluctant to lower trade barriers to allow importation of services and products from wealthier nations. Schwab was optimistic that the new environmental and labor standards for US trade deals would advance the Doha round of WTO talks. "This agreement is a prerequisite for moving US trade agreements forward" she said.