Thai deputy PM in lead to become next WTO chief

Thai deputy PM in lead to become next WTO chief

GENEVA (Reuters): Thailand's First Deputy Prime Minister Supachai Panitchpakdi was on Wednesday officially reported running strongly at the head of a four-candidate list to become next chief of the World Trade Organization.

But trade diplomats said that with the United States and the 15-member European Union, the two top global trading powers, yet to decide who would get their support, and more importantly who would not, the contest was still far from over.

Swiss ambassador William Rossier, in charge of consulting WTO delegations in Geneva on the issue, told the body's General Council that 40 of its 133 members made Supachai, who is also commerce minister, their first choice out of the four.

Former Moroccan trade minister Hassan Abouyoub had 23 first preferences, Canada's current High Commissioner (ambassador) in London, Roy Maclaren, had 15 and New Zealand's former prime minister Michael Moore had 13.

However Moore, who has been campaigning heavily in recent weeks among developing countries who make up the overwhelming majority of WTO members, came top of the second preference list with 26.

In this count, Supachai was second with 19, Aboyoub third with eight and Maclaren fourth with five. A total of 28 delegations have given no indication of their views.

The aim of Rossier's consultations, now under way for three months, is to establish which candidate can be appointed by consensus. Only if that cannot be established could a formal vote be held.

But diplomats and trade officials say they would prefer to avoid such an outcome, arguing that the WTO Director-General has to be the "candidate of all the members" and not a figure whose appointment is opposed by anyone.

The new trade body chief, to replace Renato Ruggiero who steps down at the end of April after four years in the post, will have to steer the body to the expected launch in December of fresh global trade negotiations, to last until 2003.

Until now, the WTO and its predecessor General Agreement and Tariffs and Trade have always been headed by a European, and developing countries have been increasingly vocal in calling for appointment of a figure from their midst.

Publicly the United States, which like any other WTO member can block a consensus, has said it views all four as good candidates. But diplomats say Washington is uneasy at the prospect of either Supachai or Abouyoub in the post.

According to the diplomats, U.S. sympathies focus rather on Moore, a one-time labor union activist who now strongly espouses the cause of free trade and the idea of a new formal round of world trade talks -- which Washington has now espoused after resisting it over the past two years.

The EU is known to be divided, despite efforts at a meeting in Brussels last Friday to agree that it at least should say it supports having a developing country representative, without specifying which, at the head of the WTO.

Moore is known to be viewed with suspicion by some EU members, especially France, because New Zealand is an active member of the Cairns Group of countries which spans both the developing and developed world.

The group campaigns strongly for better access for its members farm produce to still highly protected markets in Europe.

But there have been indications that, to avoid a head-on clash with Washington if it comes down firmly against the Thai and the Moroccan, Brussels might be ready to agree to the New Zealander -- as long as a European becomes a deputy director-general.