WTO

Russia Denies Delaying WTO Accession Talks

On Monday, March 5, Russia denied criticism from the European Union and the United States that it is dragging its feet in talks on joining the World Trade Organization.

Popularity: 2% [?]

March 6, 2007

AllofMP3 Releases Statement Regarding the WTO Negotiations

In the wake of recent publications regarding the obligations that Russia took up to enter WTO and in particular the obligation to shut down illegal websites, AllofMP3 has issued a statement.

Popularity: 2% [?]

December 1, 2006

EU Will Assist Russia’s WTO Entry

Russia has received EU assurances of support in the swift conclusion of multilateral talks on Russia’s accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), a Russian delegation member said on Friday quoted by Interfax.

Popularity: 1% [?]

November 24, 2006

Russia Will Not Ratify Energy Charter

Russia has no intention of ratifying the Energy Charger treaty, because it contains flaws and these flaws are well-known to the European Union, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday.

“Russia’s position is beginning to be understood better at last. The latest meeting of the Energy Charter participants was evidence of that,” he said.

Popularity: 4% [?]

November 22, 2006

Foreign Cars to Get Cheaper after Russia’s Entrance to WTO

Russia promises to decrease the import duties on foreign cars to 15%.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Putin Ends Visit to Vietnam, Returns to Moscow

Vladimir Putin has completed a visit to Vietnam and returned to Moscow, the presidential press secretary, Alexei Gromov told Itar-Tass.

Popularity: 2% [?]

November 21, 2006

Russia Completes All Bilateral WTO Talks

Russia has completed all bilateral talks on joining the World Trade Organization and will finish multilateral negotiations by next summer, the country’s chief negotiator said Friday.

Popularity: 2% [?]

November 17, 2006

Russia WTO Talks to Be Suspended Until 2008

Russia’s negotiations with the United States over its accession to the World Trade Organization may have to be suspended for at least two years, a deputy head of the Carnegie Moscow Center said on Friday, October 27.

Russia’s efforts to join the World Trade Organization reached a deadlock this July when the U.S. refused to approve the bid unless American meat imports were allowed into the country without preliminary veterinary checks.

“There are fears that the negotiating process toward signing a WTO accession protocol between Moscow and Washington will be put on hold, at least until the next political cycle in Russia and the U.S., i.e. until 2008, or even later,” Dmitry Trenin from Carnegie Moscow Center told RIA Novosti in an interview.

The presidents of both countries will see their terms expire in 2008.

Trenin said Russia has been showing an uncompromising approach in the final round of talks, and may end up either bowing to U.S. demands or dropping its bid altogether.

“Not everyone in the ruling elite is convinced that Russia really needs to join the WTO,” he said.

Another obstacle to Russia’s WTO membership is the Jackson-Vanick amendment, Trenin said. “Next year, if the protocol is signed, the issue of the Jackson-Vanick amendment will arise,” he pointed out.

A provision of the 1974 Trade Act, Jackson-Vanick set higher customs duties on goods from the Soviet Union and other nations with non-market economies and immigration restrictions. It continues to apply to Russia, even though the country has been in compliance with the freedom of immigration requirements since 1994.

According to Trenin, it is highly unlikely that the White House will pressure Congress into scrapping Jackson-Vanick, seen as discriminatory in Moscow, especially if the Democrats win a parliamentary majority in one or both houses in the coming mid-term elections.

Russia’s trade negotiator, Maxim Medvedkov, is currently discussing the issue with U.S. officials in Washington.

Earlier this month, Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref said he was hopeful the WTO accession talks with the U.S. would be completed by the end of October — the deadline set in July when Russian and American negotiators met on the sidelines of a G8 summit in St. Petersburg.

Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov also believes a breakthrough is possible. “Negotiations [with the U.S.] on Russia’s accession to the WTO are going through an intensive stage now,” he said Wednesday, but stopped short of giving a specific date by which Russia could be through with the talks.

Russia has to date completed talks with 55 of 58 WTO member nations, and has yet to sign accession protocols with the U.S., Georgia and Moldova. The two latter countries have expressed their unhappiness about Russian ban on their agricultural products, such as wine and mineral water. Georgian officials have already said that Russia won’t receive Georgia’s approval of its WTO bid until it removes the economic blocade that was recently put in place following another spat between the two neighboring countries.

Popularity: 1% [?]

October 27, 2006

Allofmp3.com Hits Back at U.S. with Accusations

Russian music download site allofmp3.com insisted it was a legitimate business and said U.S. accusations of piracy were merely an excuse to keep Russia out of the World Trade Organisation, AFP reports.

“The U.S. government is conveniently using allofmp3 as an issue to gain further concessions from Russia,” said company boss Vadim Mamotin and other executives.

“We operate under Russian law, we pay taxes in Russia and we pay royalties,” they said in response to journalists’ questions in an online news conference.

Russia has campaigned for 12 years to join the WTO but the United States is still withholding its endorsement of Moscow’s candidacy — it is the only major economy that has not yet backed Russia’s bid — citing shortcomings in several key trade sectors.

Moscow wants to join the organization both for the prestige of membership and as a means to spur diversification in its own economy, still focused heavily on raw materials export.

But U.S. negotiators have repeatedly returned to the issue of the worldwide music sales of allofmp3.com — protection of intellectual property being a major stumbling block in Russia’s negotiations to join the club.

U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab has placed allofmp3.com on a “notorious markets” list and in a speech last month she accused Russian authorities of allowing the website to operate with impunity.

The music site has a ready market outside Russia as well as at home, offering music tracks for as little as a third of a dollar and entire albums for two dollars, which compares with 99 US cents per track from iTunes.

The website’s executives denied Tuesday that the site had refused to pay royalties for its world-wide music sales.

They said the company had paid royalties to a Russian music society, the Russian Organization for Multimedia and digital Systems (ROMS), but the industry had refused to take such payments from the society.

“ROMS has offered to pay the record companies the royalties they collected but has been rebuffed… As we see it, the record companies really have an issue with ROMS and perhaps the Russian government,” they said.

They insisted the company would go from strength to strength, buoyed by the growth of the Internet, and that it was the record labels whose time was running out.

“They are concerned with making money for themselves not the artists. In our opinion, we and the artists are better off dealing directly with each other. In fact we believe it is the future of the music industry,” they said.

The owner of the website, Denis Kvasov, has been battling a lawsuit in a Moscow court by the international music industry body IFPI.

In a bid to allay U.S. concerns, Russia’s parliament gave preliminary approval last month to a strict new law on intellectual property rights that Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry
Medvedev said would bring Russian in line with Western demands.

But more widely, Russia’s negotiations to join the WTO have been hampered by Washington’s increasingly tough stance towards Moscow on the issue of Iran’s nuclear program.

Russia is the only major world economy not in the World Trade Organisation.

In Tuesday’s news conference the website’s executives refused to reveal details of the company’s finances.

The Kommersant daily estimated earlier the annual turn-over of allofmp3.com at between 25 million and 30 million dollars (20 million and 23 million euros)

Popularity: 2% [?]

October 18, 2006

Russia Toughens Internet Piracy Law to Meet WTO Entry Terms

On Friday, Sept. 1, new internet piracy laws took effect in Russia. The new, tougher legislation threatens internet pirates with jail terms of up to five years and is seen as part of Moscow’s drive to join the World Trade Organization.

Popularity: 1% [?]

September 1, 2006
Most Popular in This Category:
  1. Russia Will Not Ratify Energy Charter
  2. Putin Ends Visit to Vietnam, Returns to Moscow
  3. Foreign Cars to Get Cheaper after Russia's Entrance to WTO
  4. AllofMP3 Releases Statement Regarding the WTO Negotiations
  5. Russia Denies Delaying WTO Accession Talks
  6. Russia Completes All Bilateral WTO Talks
  7. Allofmp3.com Hits Back at U.S. with Accusations
  8. EU Will Assist Russia's WTO Entry
  9. Russia WTO Talks to Be Suspended Until 2008
  10. Russia Toughens Internet Piracy Law to Meet WTO Entry Terms
check out the Search Russia swicki at eurekster.com


Interesting Topics: