Saudi Arabia to Sign WTO Deal Soon

Saudi Arabia is all set to join the World Trade Organisation by end of this year. This follows the signing of key trade agreement with US on Friday, which says Saudi Arabia will not enforce a boycott against American firms that have trade relations with Israel.

The agreement which was signed in Washington was the fruit of “nearly five months” of intensive negotiations and was “decisive” in Saudi Arabia’s drive to join the WTO, Yamani said.

The minister said he hoped Saudi Arabia would now be able to attend a WTO ministerial gathering in Hong Kong in December “as the 149th member” of the organization.

The Hong Kong conference is meant to set the seal on four years of negotiations for a comprehensive free trade treaty.

Saudi Arabia still needs to complete talks with other WTO members but the deal with Washington removes one of the biggest obstacles that stood in the way of its membership. The Kingdom has so far signed WTO accords with 38 countries.

Saudi and US officials have described the agreement as a major achievement and said it would boost investment, economic and trade cooperation between the two countries. Announcing the deal, US Trade Representative Rob Portman hailed it as a major boost to the cause of reform in the Kingdom. “As a result of negotiations on its accession to the WTO, we will see greater openness, further development of the rule of law, and political and economic reforms in Saudi Arabia,” he said.

The United States is the last WTO member to reach a bilateral market access deal with Saudi Arabia. Riyadh must still finish work on multilateral agreement bringing its overall trade regime into line with WTO rules. It hopes to do that in time to join the world trade body this year.

Earlier this year, a bipartisan group of 47 lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives urged the Bush administration not to sign a WTO accession deal with the kingdom until it made progress on the boycott issue and did a better job of protecting human and religious rights.