Azerbaijan, Baku, 30 May / Trend, E. Aliyev /
The European Union (EU) strongly supports the efforts of Azerbaijan to join the World Trade Organization (WTO), the head of the EU Delegation to Azerbaijan Roland Kobia said on Thursday, speaking at the conference "International Trade Law in the Caucasus and Central Asia: between regional integration and globalization" held in Baku.
"The EU supports Azerbaijan in the framework of the "Eastern Partnership". There is an opportunity for negotiations with regards to the broader trade agreement with Azerbaijan. The difficulty we are facing is that Azerbaijan is not yet a WTO member. Association Agreement is the deepest form of international cooperation the EU may offer," the diplomat said.
According to him, accession into the WTO is not a challenge, but an opportunity for Azerbaijan.
"The country has been in talks on WTO membership since 1997, and this process is still ongoing. We understand that Azerbaijan should continue to protect the local market. We are aware that Azerbaijan's accession into the WTO will bring the country more expenditures rather than benefits. This means that local producers will be required to meet the WTO standards," Kobia said.
"We believe the country will join the WTO in the foreseeable future not because we want to believe it, but because we assume it is in the interests of Azerbaijan", he added.
According to WTO procedures, the country must hold 13 rounds of negotiations for becoming a member of this organization. Azerbaijan is currently at the ninth stage of the consultation, within which intensive talks on issues of mutual obligations are held.
Procedural rules will be discussed with the WTO member countries within the next (X) phase. In the context of WTO accession, Azerbaijan held bilateral talks with nearly 50 countries, which resulted in adoption of relevant documents.
The next round of multilateral and bilateral talks on Azerbaijan's membership in the WTO will be held from 3-7 June 2013. In particular, negotiations on goods and services will be held with such countries as India, South Korea, Taiwan Province of China and others.
It is also planned to hold bilateral talks with a group of countries, major exporters of agricultural products, including Argentina, Brazil, Australia and others. questions of subsidizing the agricultural sector in Azerbaijan will be agreed upon with them.
To date, Azerbaijan is in the process of bilateral negotiations with the U.S., Japan, Brazil, Ecuador, Sri Lanka, European Union, Norway, India, South Korea, Taiwan Province of China, Canada, Switzerland and Honduras to join the WTO
.
The negotiations have been completed and protocols were signed with Turkey, the Sultanate of Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan. The country is at the stage of signing the protocol with Moldova, which still considers the document.
International conference entitled "International Trade Law in the Caucasus and Central Asia: between regional integration and globalization" launched its work in Baku on Thursday. During the two-day event, experts from Azerbaijan, Georgia, Germany, Russia and Kazakhstan will discuss various aspects of international law in the economic sphere.