UNITED STATES – DEFINITIVE SAFEGUARD MEASURES ON IMPORTS OF CERTAIN STEEL PRODUCTS
Document: Notification of an Appeal by the United States under paragraph 4 of Article 16 of the Understanding on Rules and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Disputes (DSU)
Date: 14 August 2003
Document codes: WT/DS248/17; WT/DS249/11; WT/DS251/12; WT/DS252/10; WT/DS253/10; WT/DS254/10; WT/DS258/14; WT/DS259/13
Complainant: Brazil
Respondent: U.S.
Third parties: Canada, Taiwan, Cuba, Mexico, Thailand, Turkey, Venezuela
Dispute stage: Appellate Body
Agreements cited: Art. 2.1, 4  SafeguardsArt. XIX:1, X:3  GATT 1994Art. 2.2, 3  SafeguardsArt. I:1  GATT 1994Art. 5  SafeguardsArt. XVI  Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization  Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization

UNITED STATES – DEFINITIVE SAFEGUARD MEASURES
ON IMPORTS OF CERTAIN STEEL PRODUCTS
Notification of an Appeal by the United States
under paragraph 4 of Article 16 of the Understanding on Rules
and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Disputes (DSU)
The following notification, dated 11 August 2003, sent by the United States to the Dispute
Settlement Body (DSB), is circulated to Members. This notification also constitutes the Notice of
Appeal, filed on the same day with th e Appellate Body, pursuant to the Working Procedures for
Appellate Review.
Pursuant to Article 16 of the Understanding on Rules and Procedures Governing the
Settlement of Disputes ("DSU") and Rule 20 of the Working Procedures for Appellate Review , the
United States hereby notifies its decision to appeal to the Appellate Body certain issues of law
covered in the Panel Reports on (, , WT/D S251/R, WT/DS252 /R, ,
, and ) and certain legal interpretations developed by the
Panel.
1. The United States seeks review by the Appellate Body of the Panel's legal conclusion that the
application of safeguard measures on imports of certain carbon flat-rolled steel ("CCFRS"); tin mill;
hot-rolled bar; cold-finished bar; rebar; welded pipe; fittings, flanges, and tool joints ("FFTJ");
stainless steel bar; stainless steel rod; and stainless steel wire is inconsistent with Articles XIX:1 of
the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1994 ("GATT 1994") and Article 3.1 of the Agreement
on Safeguards ("Safeguards Agreement")
1 on the grounds that the United States failed to provide a
reasoned and adequate explanation demonstrating that "unforeseen developments" had resulted in
increased imports of each of these products causing serious injury to the relevant domestic industry.
(Paras. 10.148-10.150 and 11.2.) These findings are in error, and are based on erroneous findings on
issues of law and related legal interpretations, including, for example,

1Unless indicated otherwise, reference to articles with Arabic numerals are to articles of the Safeguards
Agreement and references to articles with Roman numerals are to articles of GATT 1994.
WT/DS248/17, WT/DS249/11,
WT/DS251/12, WT/DS252/10,
WT/DS253/10, WT/DS254/10,
WT/DS258/14, WT/DS259/13

(a) that the Panel could not consider data on the record of the U.S. International Trade
Commission ("USITC") and cited in other sections of the USITC report in evaluating
whether the competent authorities provided their findings and reasoned conclusions
with regard to unforeseen developments in accordance with Article 3.1
(paras. 10.133-10.135 and 10.145);
(b) that the USITC was obliged to explain why the specific products under examination
were affected individually by the confluence of unforeseen developments
(paras. 10.127 and 10.147); and
(c) that the USITC did not sufficiently support and explain its conclusion that the
displacement of steel on world markets led to increased imports to the United States
from all sources (paras. 10.122-10.123, 10.125, 10.143-10.144 and 10.146).
2. The United States seeks review by the Appellate Body of the Panel's legal conclusion that the
application of safeguard measures on imports of CCFRS, hot-rolled bar, and stainless steel rod is
inconsistent with Articles 2.1 and 3.1, on the grounds that the United States failed to provide a
reasoned and adequate explanation of how the facts supported its determinations with respect to
increased imports of these products. (Paras. 10.181, 10.183, 10.186-10.187, 10.204, 10.208, 10.210,
10.267, 10.271, 10.277, and 11.2.) These findings are in error, and are based on erroneous findings
on issues of law and related legal interpretations, including, for example,
(a) that increased imports must be "sudden," and must "evidence[] a certain degree of
recentness, suddenness, sharpness and significance" (paras. 10.159 and 10.166-
10.167);
(b) that in light of the decrease in imports of CCFRS, hot-rolled bar, and stainless steel
rod between interim 2000 and interim 2001, the USITC report did not contain an
adequate and reasoned explanation of how the facts support its determinations
regarding the absolute and relative increases in imports of these products
(paras. 10.181, 10.184, 10.204, 10.208, 10.267, and 10.271); and
(c) that an increase in imports in 1998 (for CCFRS) and in 2000 (for hot-rolled bar and
stainless steel rod) was not recent enough at the time of the USITC determination to
support a finding under Article 2.1 that imports of CCFRS, hot-rolled bar, or stainless
steel rod are "being imported in . . . increased quantities" (paras. 10.181-10.182,
10.185, 10.207, 10.269).
3. The United States seeks review by the Appellat e Body of the Panel' s legal conclusion that the
determinations regarding both increased imports of tin mill and stainless steel wire and also the causal
link between these increased imports and serious injury to the corresponding domestic industry are
inconsistent with Articles 2.1, 3.1, and 4.2(b) on the grounds that the explanations given for these
determinations consisted of alternative explanations partly departing from each other, which given the
different product bases, cannot be reconciled as a matter of substance. (Paras. 10.200, 10.262, 10.422,
10.573, and 11.2.) These findings are in error, and are based on erroneous findings on issues of law
and related legal interpretations, including, for example,
(a) that findings by the competent authorities that are based on differently defined
products are impossible to reconcile (paras. 10.194, 10.262, 10.422, and 10.572); and
WT/DS248/17, WT/DS249/11,
WT/DS251/12, WT/DS252/10,
WT/DS253/10, WT/DS254/10,
WT/DS258/14, WT/DS259/13

(b) that a reasoned and adequate explanation is not contained in a set of findings by the
competent authorities that rests on more than one like product definition
(paras. 10.194, 10.262, 10.422, and 10.572).
4. The United States seeks review by the Appellate Body of the Panel's legal conclusion that the
application of safeguard measures on imports of CCFRS, hot-rolled bar, cold-finished bar, rebar,
welded pipe, FFTJ, and stainless steel bar is inc onsistent with Articles 2.1, 3.1, and 4.2(b) of the
Safeguards Agreement, on the grounds that the United States failed to provide a reasoned and
adequate explanation that a "causal link" existed between any increased imports and serious injury or
threat of serious injury to the relevant domestic producers with respect to increased imports of these
products. (paras. 10.418-10.419, 10.444-10.445, 10.468-10.469, 10.486-10.487, 10.502-10.503,
10.535-10.536, 10.568-10.569, and 11.2) These findings are in error, and are based on erroneous
findings on issues of law and related legal interpretations, including, for example,
(a) that the USITC failed to provide a reasoned and adequate explanation of its finding
that there was a causal link between increased imports of CCFRS and the serious
injury suffered by the domestic industry; more specifically that:
(i) the USITC failed to provide a reasoned and adequate explanation of its
finding that there was a coincidence in import and industry trends during the
period (paras. 10.374-10.376); and
(ii) that the USITC failed to provide a compelling explanation of why the
"conditions of competition in the CCFRS market established a causal link
between imports and industry trends (para. 10.381);
(b) that the USITC's definition of CCFRS as a like product prevented the application of a
causation analysis consistent with Article 4.2(b) for the industry producing that
product (paras. 10.378, 10.380, 10.416-10.417);
(c) that the USITC failed to provide a compelling explanation that a causal link existed
between increased imports of cold-finished bar and the serious injury suffered by the
domestic industry (para. 10.458);
(d) that the USITC's non-attribution analysis failed to separate and distinguish the
injurious effects of particular factors other than increased imports so that the injury
caused by these factors, together with other factors, was not attributed to increased
imports of CCFRS, hot-rolled bar, cold-finished bar, rebar, welded pipe, FFTJ, and
stainless steel bar (paras. 10.389, 10.396, 10.401, 10.407-10.410, 10.418-10.419,
10.440, 10.443-10.444, 10.467-10.468, 10.484-10.486, 10.496, 10.499-10.501,
10.529, 10.533-10.535, 10.560, and 10.565-10.568);
(e) that, in addition to an individual assessment of the effects of other factors causing
injury to the domestic industry, Article 4.2(b) calls for "an overall assessment of such
'other factors'" (para. 10.332) or for an evaluation of the "cumulative effects of
individual factors" causing injury (paras. 10.409 and 10.567);
(f) that a competent authority may be required, in certain circumstances, to use an
economic modeling analysis to quantify the amount of injury caused by imports and
WT/DS248/17, WT/DS249/11,
WT/DS251/12, WT/DS252/10,
WT/DS253/10, WT/DS254/10,
WT/DS258/14, WT/DS259/13

other factors causing injury as part of its causation analysis under Articles 2.1, 3.1,
and 4.2(b) (paras. 10.340-10.342); and
(g) that the explanation of the competent authorities must be "clear and unambiguous"
and "establish explicitly" that injury caused by factors other than increased imports is
not attributed to increased imports (para. 10.330).
5. The United States seeks review by the Appellate Body of the Panel's legal conclusion that the
application of safeguard measures on imports of CCFRS, tin mill, hot-rolled bar, cold-finished bar,
rebar, welded pipe, FFTJ, stainless steel bar, stainless steel rod, and stainless steel wire is inconsistent
with Articles 2.1 and 4.2, on the grounds that the Un ited States failed to comply with the requirement
of "parallelism" because it had not established that imports from sources subject to the safeguard
measure satisfied the conditions for application of a safeguard measure. (Paras. 10.609, 10.615,
10.623, 10.633, 10.643, 10.653, 10.660, 10.670, 10.680, 10.685, 10.692, 10.699, and 11.2) These
findings are in error, and are based on erroneous findings on issues of law and related legal
interpretations, including, for example,
(a) that Articles 2.1 and 4.2 make it necessary to account for the fact that excluded
imports may have some injurious impact on the domestic industry and that the USITC
analysis failed to account for this impact (paras. 10.598, 10.605-10.606, 10.621,
10.629-10.630, 10.639-10.640, 10.650, 10.657, 10.666-10.667, 10.676-10.677, and
10.688);
(b) that the USITC's findings regarding imports from Israel and Jordan did not establish
explicitly or provide a reasoned and adequate explanation that imports from sources
not excluded from the measure satisfied the conditions for application of a safeguard
measure (paras. 10.607-10.608, 10.622, 10.631-10.632, 10.641-10.642, 10.651-
10.652, 10.658-10.659, 10.668-10.669, 10.678-10.679, 10.689-10.690, and 10.698);
(c) that the views of Commissioner Bragg did not meet the requirements of parallelism
with regard to tin mill and stainless steel wire because she "reached findings on the
broader category of CCFRS" and "on a broader category including stainless steel
wire" (paras. 10.615 and 10.685); and
(d) that Commissioner Koplan's parallelism analysis regarding stainless steel wire does
not contain the required findings that establish explicitly, with a reasoned and
adequate explanation, that imports from s ources other than Canada, Mexico, Israel,
and Jordan satisfy the conditions of Article 2.1 as elaborated by Article 4.2
(para. 10.688).
6. The United States seeks review of the Panel's findings referenced above on the grounds that
the Panel acted inconsistently with Article 11 of the DSU in that it failed to make an objective
assessment of the matter before it, including an objective assessment of the facts of the case and the
applicability of and conformity with GATT 1994 and the Safeguards Agreement. As particular
examples,
(a) the Panel found that the USITC's demonstr ation of unforeseen developments was not
sufficiently supported and explained, even though the Panel found the explanation
plausible, cited no alternative explanation, and found no error in the USITC's
reasoning or the data used to support that reasoning (paras. 10.145-10.150); and
WT/DS248/17, WT/DS249/11,
WT/DS251/12, WT/DS252/10,
WT/DS253/10, WT/DS254/10,
WT/DS258/14, WT/DS259/13

(b) made self-contradictory findings (including in paragraphs 10.173, 10.182, 10.192,
10.225, 10.433-10.437, 10.442, and 10.519).
7. The United States also seeks review of the Panel's findings referenced above on the grounds
that the Panel acted inconsistently with Article 12.7 of the DSU, in that its report did not set out the
basic rationale behind its findings and recommendations.