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Support should be given to LDCs: China
17/12/2005 12:36

Support to the least developed countries should be covered in the "early harvest" of the conference, the Chinese delegation to the on-going sixth World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference said in Hong Kong on Friday.

The delegation attended several closed-door meetings Thursday,like "green-room meeting" on development, talks on newly acceded members, and G20 coordinating meetings, and elaborated Chinese stands on these issues.

On the development issue, China holds that it's a political commitment and ethic issue for developed members to provide duty-free, quota-free treatment to least developed countries.

As for the scope of products enjoying special treatment, developing countries should enjoy certain flexibility, said the delegation.

China insisted that recently-acceded WTO members should be given more preferential treatment than developing members. They should also be given flexibility in less-reduction or no-reductiontariffs.

China said that new members adopted almost 100 percent bound tariffs. For China, applied rates and bound tariffs are at the same level, so, any reduction commitment China made will be substantive and a real cut.

At a G20 coordinating meeting, China brought up issues which it thinks the G20 should discuss, including the issue of newly acceded membership.



 Xinhua news