RESTRICTED  
  
WT/REG/M/103  
 
26 July 2022 
(22-5650) Page: 1/4 
Committee on Regional Trade Agreements  
Hundredth  and Third  Session    
 
 
NOTE ON THE MEETING OF 27 JUNE  2022 
Chairm an: Ambassador H.E. Mr. Taeho LEE (Republic of Korea ) 
A. ADOPTION OF THE AGENDA  
1.1.  The 10 3rd Session of the Committee on Regional Trade Agreements (hereinafter "CRTA" or the 
"Committee") was convened in Airgram WTO/AIR/RTA/ 28/Rev.1  dated 1 7 June 2022.  
1.2.  The Chairman welcomed delegations to the to the 10 3rd Session of the CRTA. He recalled the 
meeting was subject to a hybrid approach, with some Members in the room and others connecting 
remotely through Interprefy.  
1.3.  With respect to Agenda Item G "Other Business", the Chairman  wished to inform Members 
about the proposed dates  for CRTA meetings for the rest of the year.  
1.4.  The Committee adopted  the following  Agenda:  
A. Adoption of the Agenda  
B. Early Announcements  
C. Notifications of regional trade agreements:  
I. Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement between the EFTA States and 
Indonesia, goods and services  
II. Free Trade Agreement between Nicaragua and the Separate Customs Territory of 
Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu, Goods and Services – Notification of 
suspension  
D. Non-notified RTAs  
E. Status on the preparation of factual presentations  
F. Consideration of Regional Trade Agreements  
I. Free Trade Agreement between Ukrain e and Israel, goods  
II. Preferential Trade Agreement between Namibia and Zimbabwe, goods  
III. Association Agreement between the United Kingdom and Chile, goods and 
services  
IV. Agreement on Trade Continuity between the United Kingdom and Canada, goods 
and services  
V. Association agreement between the United Kingdom and Jordan, goods  
VI. Association Agreement between the European Union and Central America 
(Costa  Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama), goods 
and services  
G. Other b usiness  
 
B.  EARLY ANNOUNCEMENTS  
1.5.  The Chairman  indicated that no early announcements had been received since 2019. He invited 
all Members that were active in RTAs to accordingly inform the Committee of recent developments. 
He also reminded Members to inform  the Secretariat of any changes in the status of early 
announcements.  WT/REG/M/103  
 
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  C. NOTIFICATIONS OF REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS  
1.6.  The Chairman  indicated that two notifications had been received since the 102nd session of the 
CRTA. He opened the floor separately for each Agreement.  
C.I. Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement between the EFTA States and 
Indonesia, goods and services  (WT/REG46 4/N/1-S/C/N/1101)  
1.7.  The representative of the United States  thanked the Parties to the Agree ment for the 
notification  and for participating in the very valuable notification and transparency exercise.  
C.II. Free Trade Agreement between Nicaragua and the Separate Customs Territory of 
Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu, goods and services – Notificat ion of suspensio n 
(WT/REG267/N/2/Rev.1 - S/C/N/500/Add.1)  
D. NON-NOTIFIED RTAS  
1.8.  The Chairman  stated that an updated list of non -notified RTAs had been recently circulated as 
WT/REG/W/16 7. The list contained 61 RTAs issued in factual presentations up to 15  June 2022. 
Compared to the previous list of March 2022  (WT/REG/W/16 5), two RTAs had been added and one  
had been removed.  
E. Status on the preparation of Factual Presentations  
1.9.  As regards the preparation of the factual presentations under the remit of the CRTA , the 
Chairman  informed the Committee that in the case of RTAs involving WTO Members only there were 
currently  64 RTAs for which a factual presentation had to be prepared, counting goods and services 
separately. Factual presentations on a further 37 RT As involving non -Members were to be prepared, 
counting goods and services separately, as previously agreed by the Committee. The factual 
presentations for six other services agreements were on hold, pending the negotiation of services 
commitments. Of those , one involved non -members.  
1.10.  He had held consultations with delegations regarding the backlog of factual presentations due 
to the late receipt of data necessary for their preparation and also comments on draft factual 
presentations. Certain delegations had failed to respond to his request for consultations in this 
regard. He hoped that the delegations would provide the missing  information as soon as possible. 
An updated list of all such RTAs had been recently circulated as document WT/REG/W/16 8/Rev.1.  
1.11.  He inform ed the Committ ee that the delegation of the United Kingdom (UK) had requested 
the Secretariat that the consideration of some of its agreements be put on hold for a brief period 
given the heavy workload faced by its government officials with regard to  the factual presentations 
already drafted by the Secretariat. In terms of figures , there were 40 RTAs in force involving the UK 
that ha d been notified to the WTO, of which about half cover ed both goods and services . Upon 
conclu sion of the meeting, the Com mittee would have considered five of these RTAs , with 35 RTAs 
therefore remain ing. Factual Presentations for five of these would  be circulated in the near future . 
For two  other RTAs , Factual Presentations were at the "comment stage" of the Transparency 
Mechanism and it had been agreed with the UK t hat an addition al two  Factual Presentations (for 
agreements with Mexico and Egypt) would be sent for comment in July . Complete data ha d been 
received for an additional 10 Factual Presentations; and  finally, data was not complete for the 
remaining 16 agreements.  That represented indeed a heavy workload – for the UK, for the 
Secretariat, and for all Members. While expressing his gratitude to the UK for its cooperation, he 
therefore propose d to invite the Secretariat to continue its coordination with the UK and to inform 
the parties to the remaining agreements when the draft factual presentations would  be sent to them 
for comment s. 
1.12.  The Chairman  noted the consideration of the GCC -Singapore ha d been dropped from t he 
agenda following the Parties' request.  
1.13.  The representative of the United States  thanked the Chairman for his report particularly 
outlining the challenges of multiple factual presentations for the UK . Her delegation encourage d 
Parties to provide the required full set of data and information  outstanding to the Secretariat in order WT/REG/M/103  
 
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  to complete the drafting of the se Factual Presentations. She referred specifically to the multiple 
instances where the Secretariat had been waiting for more than 10 years for this information. The  
United States was  also concerned that some Members continued to wait for responses to questions 
they had posed on certain factual presentations. This lack of transparency cont ributed to the 
decreasing relevance of the WTO to some stakeholders. She urged Members to participate in this 
very valuable transparency  exercise.  
1.14.  The representative of the European Union  thanked the Chair for the update. Her delegation 
echoed the call s made by the representative of the United States for Members to provide timely 
information including replies to questions. It was important to respect the agreed deadlines to 
enhance transparency and to enable a timely review by Members of preferential trade agreements.  
1.15.  The representative of Canada  asked Members that had not yet provided responses to 
questions raised by other Members to do so  as set out in the requirements of the Transparency 
Mechanism . 
1.16.  As was customary, the Chairman  invited  a representative of the Secretariat to provide 
additional information on the status of the preparation of factual presentations.  
1.17.  With regard to agreements among WTO Members, the representative of the Secretariat  stated 
that f or Türkiye -Korea, services on ly, and Korea -Central America, goods and services, comments 
from the Parties were awaited . For ASEAN -Hong Kong, China, goods and services, the Secretariat 
had just started drafting the factual presentation. For Peru's accession to the CPTPP data had been 
received from some of the Parties  and clarification and additional data from some Parties were 
awaited. For EU -Papua New Guinea ( PNG), Fiji, goods, no data had been received from PNG and Fiji . 
With regard to the accession to this agreement by Samoa and the Solomon Islands, data had been 
received. For ECOWAS, goods, some data had been received from Togo, Niger,  Senegal and  Benin ; 
no data had been received from the other Parties . For the ASEAN Free Trade Agreement , the 
Secretariat was awaiting data from  ASEAN. For India -Mauritius, services, the Secretariat was 
awaiting data from  India.   For Türkiye -EFTA and EFTA -Ecuador data was awaited from EFTA. For 
EFTA-Indonesia data was awaited from the Part ies. For the GCC, goods, and GCC -Singapore, 
services, responses were awaited from the Parties to Members' questions.  
1.18.  With regard to the notifications involving the United Kingdom , comments had been received 
from the Parties for UK-Switzerland and Liechtens tein, UK-Kenya and UK-Israel, all goods  and for 
UK-Korea , goods and services ; some comments had been received for UK-ESA. The Secret ariat was 
awaiting comments for UK-Albania. T he factual presentations for UK Agreements with Egypt and 
Mexico would be sent shortly to the Parties for comment s, as had been indicated by the Chairman . 
Factual presentations were being drafted on the UK's Agreements with the following parties: Japan, 
Georgia, the E uropean Union and North Macedonia , but,  as mentioned earlier b y the Chair, the 
Secretariat would discuss when to send these for comment with the Parties . For the remaining 
agreements involving the UK, the Secretariat w as yet to start drafting factual presentations or  still 
awaiting data or further clarifications from  a number of the non -UK parties.  
1.19.  For agreements involving non -members, the Secretariat was drafting the factual 
presentation s for UK -Serbia , goods and services, and Türkiye -Serbia, services. For the CIS 
Agreement, goods, some comments had been received. Fo r the EAEU -Iran Agreement, goods, the 
deadline for data submission had been  22 June 2020 and no data had been received.  For the 
EAEU -Serbia Agreement , goods, data ha d been received only from Serbia . For the following 
agreements data was not complete: EFTA -Lebanon, Türkiye -Syria, Ukraine -Azerbaijan, 
Ukraine -Turkmenistan, and the Russian Federation -Turkmenistan. The data requests had been made 
a few years ago. For Pacer Plus data was complete and it was  the Secretariat's understanding that 
there m ight be other ratifications soon  so it would wait for further clarification . For the accession of 
the Comoros to the EU -ESA Agreement data had been due on 30 March 2021 ; the Secretariat had 
received data from th e EU. For UK -Faroe Islands, UK -Lebanon, and UK -Cariforum, data had been 
due on 5 May 2021. For UK -Palestine data had been due on 10 May 2021. For UK-Kosovo1 data had 
been due on 12 May 2021 and for Türkiye -Kosovo data was due on 11 May 2022 . The Secretari at 
was still awaiting most of the data for these agreements.  
 
1 Any r eference to Kosovo shall be understood to be in the context of the United Nations Security 
Council resolution 1244 (1999).  WT/REG/M/103  
 
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  F. CONSIDERATION OF REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS  
ITEM F.I 
(The minutes of the consideration of this Agreement were being distributed as a separate document 
WT/REG4 44/M/1)  
 
ITEM F.II  
(The minutes o f the consideration of this Agreement were being distributed as a separate document 
WT/REG4 50/M/1)  
 
ITEM F.III 
(The minutes of the consideration of this Agreement were being distributed as a separate document 
WT/REG4 23/M/1)  
 
ITEM F.I V 
(The minutes of the consideration of this Agreement were being distributed as a separate document 
WT/REG4 19/M/1)  
 
ITEM F. V 
(The minutes of the consideration of this Agreement were being distributed as a separate document 
WT/REG4 53/M/1)  
 
ITEM F. VI 
(The minutes of the consi deration of this Agreement were being distributed as a separate document 
WT/REG 332/M/1)  
 
G. OTHER BUSINESS  
1.20.  The representative of the  Russian Federation  noted his need to respond to continuous 
attempts to politicize the work of the WTO. First, Russia denied  all the blame it had received . 
Statements delivered by some Members at th e session condemn ing Russia brought no added value 
for the WTO but served as an instrument for th ese delegations to promote their political agenda s. 
He put to the Chairman's attentio n that these statements went  beyond th e agenda of the  meeting.  
1.21.  The Chairman  informed the Committee of the dates for the next meetings of the CRTA in 
2022, which had been tentatively scheduled for 22–23 September 2022  and 14-15 November 2022 .  
1.22.  The Committee took note  of the comments made.  
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