`No stringent pre-requisite for FTAs with ASEAN'

`No stringent pre-requisite for FTAs with ASEAN'

Jason Gutierrez, Agence France-Presse, Manila

ASEAN countries can sign bilateral free trade agreements (FTA)
with the United States without stringent pre-requisites, other
than reforms and a willingness to open up their economies,
Washington's top trade negotiator said Wednesday.

U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick met with his
counterparts from the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) in Manila to sell an initiative launched by
President George W. Bush for bilateral FTAs in the region.

Washington has already completed negotiations with Vietnam and
Singapore and Zoellick said it wants to expand the program to
other ASEAN members -- Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos,
Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand.

The Enterprise for ASEAN Initiative seeks to create a regional
network of FTAs, although there are no specific timetables for
each country to strike a deal with the U.S..

Two-way trade between ASEAN and the U.S. reached US$120
billion in 2001, making ASEAN -- with its consumer base of $500
million -- Washington's third largest trading partner.

U.S. agricultural exports to ASEAN countries currently stand
at $2.6 billion and could still increase if FTAs are sealed,
officials said.

Washington, however, recognizes that there are some problems
that cover all countries, so it will allow each ASEAN country
flexibility to move at their own pace toward an FTA, Zoellick
told reporters.

"We're not trying to use this as a hard and fast set of
preconditions. We are trying to share with people our insights on
what we think is important for economic development, how trade
can support that, our experience with other agreements, and
determine which countries want to move towards that level of
integration."

Philippine Trade Secretary Manuel Roxas, who chaired the
informal meeting, said senior ASEAN officials would be asked to
come up with a "specific work program" for a region-wide trade
and investment facilitation agreement to pave the way for
individual FTAs.

The agreement could have "unique characteristics", including
an "opt-in, opt-out mechanism" for some specific provision that
certain nations might have difficulty with.

Zoellick noted the U.S. has been negotiating for similar FTAs
with 34 countries in the West, many of which are included in its
watchlist of intellectual property rights violators.

"Free trade is about freedom and openness. The prime point is
that we like to try to help developing countries, democracies
achieve economic reforms and build support for openness," he
said.

President Gloria Arroyo met with ministers from ASEAN at the
presidential palace and assured Zoellick her government fully
supported U.S. economic policies.

However she pressed for ASEAN countries to be given more
access to the U.S. market.

"There are barriers and sanctions that the Filipino people
perceive to be adding to the poverty of the nation," Arroyo said
without being specific.

ASEAN economic ministers welcomed the initiative and said it
underscored the "importance that the United States places on
enhancing trade ties to ASEAN."

They said the U.S. also agreed to support the entry of
Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar to the World Trade Organization in
line with its goal of establishing FTAs.

Zoellick reminded ASEAN members that entering into an FTA with
the U.S. was "a particularly serious endeavor" that presents
certain challenges.

For some countries, FTAs could be seen as a "device they use
to help their own internal reforms." It would require individual
countries to prepare comprehensive reforms and participation of
the private sector.

The U.S. government, however, would not "force countries to
move more quickly than they can," Zoellick said.