07-04-2006, 09:31 PM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Ritual sulking </b>
The Pioneer News Desk
WTO is about negotiations, not tantrums ---- The walkout by Commerce Minister Kamal Nath was not merely the straw that broke the camel's back at the WTO mini-ministerial at Geneva; it was something substantially more damaging. It enshrined the throwing of a tantrum as a ritual at WTO events. Instead of leveraging his position as the principal negotiator representing one of the largest economies of the world, Mr Kamal Nath chose to act as an opposition parliamentarian making a political statement. <!--emo&:thumbdown--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/thumbsdownsmileyanim.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='thumbsdownsmileyanim.gif' /><!--endemo--> His remark, that "there was no point" in continuing, smacked of a casual disregard of the principles on which GATT was formed, and with which WTO has continued. Just eight days prior to his impetuous and totally unnecessary intervention, he had spoken like a statesman at a press conference in Washington DC, in which he personified optimism and sagacity. And why shouldn't he have? The strategy to forge a grand alliance of 110-member countries headed by India, an endeavour mooted in the early 1990s, had paid off during the Ministerial in Hong Kong in December. He had sounded positive on the 'self selection' consensus by which developing countries could be allowed to specify the areas in which they would not agree on subsidy cuts. In this background, it is difficult to appreciate the reasons for his turn-around half way down the meet. Surely, he was not unaware of the sparks that were waiting to fly at Geneva? After all, the Europeans and Americans had been wrestling over agriculture subsidies since the beginning of the Uruguay Round and many an impasse had been forced upon the movement for free trade over the issue. Understandably, India and the developing world had a fight waiting for them. But, Mr Nath, who is not new to multilateral engagements (he was India's representative to the 1992 Earth Summit), chose grandstanding over diplomacy.
All this may make many wonder about a coincidence. Around the same time as Mr Kamal Nath was authoring the Geneva conundrum, <b>the Prime Minister was performing somersaults with agricultural rhetoric in Hyderabad over the worsening plight of farmers. Could there be a link between the UPA Government's embarrassment over its failure to mitigate farmers' suicides (a 2004 election issue) and a thinly veiled attempt to externalise the responsibility as seen in Geneva?</b> Perhaps, Mr Nath borrowed a page out of the Left's book of tricks, but it will only end up lowering India's prestige. Those who recall Mr Arun Jaitley's prolonged stay at Cancun (in September 2003) to fight over the 'Singapore issues', fail to recognise a strain of continuity in India's behaviour at Geneva. There is a sense of deja vu about the collapse of dialogue; Mr Kamal Nath should have shown more maturity as a negotiator for not only India but the farmers of the developing world.
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The Pioneer News Desk
WTO is about negotiations, not tantrums ---- The walkout by Commerce Minister Kamal Nath was not merely the straw that broke the camel's back at the WTO mini-ministerial at Geneva; it was something substantially more damaging. It enshrined the throwing of a tantrum as a ritual at WTO events. Instead of leveraging his position as the principal negotiator representing one of the largest economies of the world, Mr Kamal Nath chose to act as an opposition parliamentarian making a political statement. <!--emo&:thumbdown--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/thumbsdownsmileyanim.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='thumbsdownsmileyanim.gif' /><!--endemo--> His remark, that "there was no point" in continuing, smacked of a casual disregard of the principles on which GATT was formed, and with which WTO has continued. Just eight days prior to his impetuous and totally unnecessary intervention, he had spoken like a statesman at a press conference in Washington DC, in which he personified optimism and sagacity. And why shouldn't he have? The strategy to forge a grand alliance of 110-member countries headed by India, an endeavour mooted in the early 1990s, had paid off during the Ministerial in Hong Kong in December. He had sounded positive on the 'self selection' consensus by which developing countries could be allowed to specify the areas in which they would not agree on subsidy cuts. In this background, it is difficult to appreciate the reasons for his turn-around half way down the meet. Surely, he was not unaware of the sparks that were waiting to fly at Geneva? After all, the Europeans and Americans had been wrestling over agriculture subsidies since the beginning of the Uruguay Round and many an impasse had been forced upon the movement for free trade over the issue. Understandably, India and the developing world had a fight waiting for them. But, Mr Nath, who is not new to multilateral engagements (he was India's representative to the 1992 Earth Summit), chose grandstanding over diplomacy.
All this may make many wonder about a coincidence. Around the same time as Mr Kamal Nath was authoring the Geneva conundrum, <b>the Prime Minister was performing somersaults with agricultural rhetoric in Hyderabad over the worsening plight of farmers. Could there be a link between the UPA Government's embarrassment over its failure to mitigate farmers' suicides (a 2004 election issue) and a thinly veiled attempt to externalise the responsibility as seen in Geneva?</b> Perhaps, Mr Nath borrowed a page out of the Left's book of tricks, but it will only end up lowering India's prestige. Those who recall Mr Arun Jaitley's prolonged stay at Cancun (in September 2003) to fight over the 'Singapore issues', fail to recognise a strain of continuity in India's behaviour at Geneva. There is a sense of deja vu about the collapse of dialogue; Mr Kamal Nath should have shown more maturity as a negotiator for not only India but the farmers of the developing world.
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