PARIS, 14 June 2005 — France backs the admission of Saudi Arabia to the World Trade Organization, which should be decided upon in December, French President Jacques Chirac said yesterday.
“We are working for the admission of Saudi Arabia to the WTO, which should be decided on in principle in July and definitively in December,” Chirac told Saudi Deputy Defense Minister Prince Khaled ibn Sultan at the opening of the Paris Air Show.
Saudi Arabia’s bid to join the WTO has foundered in the absence of a bilateral Saudi-US admission agreement. But the parties agreed in April to complete negotiations in order to allow Riyadh’s accession to the Geneva-based global trade monitoring body by the end of the year.
A country wishing to join the WTO must grant concessions and reductions in customs barriers to its principal trading partners that are then extended to all WTO members.
Saudi Arabia applied to join the WTO’s predecessor, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, in 1993 and has been seeking admission to the WTO since 1995. It is the only member of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which also groups Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar, to remain outside the WTO.