March 22, 2006	Wednesday	Safar 21, 1427

BRUSSELS, March 21: EU trade chief Peter Mandelson said on Tuesday that WTO talks to free up global commerce are in a new, critical phase and urged the EU’s trading partners to make concessions to open the way for progress. “We have, in my view, reached a new phase in the process of this negotiation,” the trade commissioner told the European Parliament’s international trade committee.

“Since we are approaching the end phase in the (talks), we now need to deal with all negotiating areas simultaneously. There is a limited number of cards left on the table — and they are the big ones.

WTO negotiators are struggling to give fresh impetus to the Doha round of talks in the World Trade Organization, launched in the Qatari capital in 2001 with the aim of boosting development in the world’s poorest nations.

Mandelson said the ball was now in the court of the EU’s trading partners to make further concessions in talks.

“We are ready to continue to play a constructive role in the round, including on agriculture, but we need to see real cuts in industrial tariffs,” he said.—AFP