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Aide-Memoire of the Second MERCOSUR-CAN
Meeting
Montevideo, August 24, 2001
The Second
MERCOSUR-CAN Meeting was held in Montevideo
on August 22 to 24, 2001 in order to
continue the negotiations for forming a free
trade area between the two blocs.
The agenda of
the meeting is set out in Annex I.
Annex II contains the list of participants.
The following
topics were addressed during the course of
the meeting:
1.
Consideration of the Regulatory Agreement
for creating a free trade area: MERCOSUR
proposal and CAN counter-proposal.
The
delegations studied the draft Agreement on
the basis of the Andean counter-proposal and
the results of their deliberations are
contained in Annex III.
2. Dispute
Settlement.
The
delegations decided to take up the subject
of dispute settlement concurrently with the
holding of the plenary session.
Proposals on
the subject were presented and justified and
there were exchanges of opinion particularly
in regard to aspects on which positions
differed; these referred basically to the
following matters:
- Sphere of
application of the mechanism, in particular
whether it should encompass situations of
annulment or impairment and whether measures
incompatible with the Agreement should be
included within it.
-Possibility
of choosing between the regional forum and
that of the WTO.
-Stage of
involvement of a group of experts.
- Members of
the Court of Arbitration’s status of jurists.
-Consultation
or direct negotiations level or body.
-Criteria for
imposing compensatory measures and the
possibility in establishing those measures
of considering differences in levels of
development.
-Involvement
of third parties in controversies.
The parties
agreed to examine those issues in greater
depth before their next meeting.
3.
Safeguards
The MERCOSUR
delegation delivered its proposal on
safeguards so that it may be discussed at
the next meeting.
4. Origin
The MERCOSUR
delegation gave a general explanation of
what the bloc proposal will be regarding the
Rules of Origin, specifying the points on
which it will agree with or differ from the
Andean proposal based on the LAIA’s General
Rules of Origin as provided for in
Resolution 252 of the Committee of
Representatives.
The two
delegations will take up the issue again
once MERCOSUR has readied its proposal,
which is to be circulated by the Pro Tempore
Chair on September 17th.
5. Sanitary
and Phytosanitary Measures
The Andean
delegation delivered a counter-proposal on
Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures and the
MERCOSUR delegation promised to send in its
observations by September 7th at
the latest.
6. Other
business
The two
delegations agreed at the next meeting to
exchange information about tariffs and trade
statistics.
7.
Specification of the date and site of the
next meeting
It was decided
to hold the next MERCOSUR-CAN meeting on
October 17 to 19, 2001 in Lima, Peru.
The MERCOSUR
delegation also proposed holding two
meetings in November, one tentatively in
Lima during the week of November 5th
and the other in Montevideo during the week
of November 26th.
For the
delegation of the CAN
SILVIA ANZOLA
For the
delegation of the MERCOSUR
RICARDO NARIO
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