The WTO members, as Ambassador Barshefsky said, came with good will and the intent to launch a new Round, centered upon the negotiations to which all WTO members were already committed on agriculture and the services industries, but also taking up technology, trade facilitation and other topics. As all of you are aware, this did not happen. The Ministerial suspended without opening a Round. And as we look ahead, without engaging in competitions to assign or avoid blame, we should understand and act on the reasons it did so. The European Union, for example, remains unwilling to contemplate major changes in its agricultural subsidies and protection.
Japan has similar constraints.
And we in the United States, of course, have our own sensitivities to address as well. And the trading system must be mature and responsive enough to act on reasonable, constructive criticisms, if it is to enjoy the support it should have in the years ahead. Many in the developed world feel that policies to promote growth and open markets worldwide have outpaced policies to address sustainable development and working conditions. These fears are balanced by suspicions in poorer countries that these concerns might be abused to discriminate against their products, and that the world is already less open to the products in which they hold comparative advantages. And thus Ambassador Barshefsky decided to suspend the Ministerial, and give the various delegations time to refocus on their goals, review their negotiating positions and perhaps develop some fresh ideas.