[Ip-health] Knight Ridder: WTO Proposal Benefits US, Europe, Critics Charge

[Mike Palmedo]

Thanks to Kris Toreson for sending this story...


WTO draft proposal benefits U.S., Europe, critics charge

Knight Ridder - Saturday, September 13, 2003
By Ricardo Sandoval and Alfredo Corchado

CANCUN, Mexico _ Polarized trading blocs wasted little time Saturday in
branding a proposed declaration from the World Trade Organization as a
gift to the United States and Europe that does nothing for struggling
farmers in developing nations.

Some delegates inside the Cancun Convention Center on Mexico's Caribbean
coast seemed as angry at the WTO process as the 2,000 anti-global trade
demonstrators outside _ who dismantled barriers and burned an effigy of
the trade organization. Despite minor skirmishes, Mexican police allowed
an international mix of protesters to march and chant under an intense
tropical sun.

[snip]

Before the meeting, WTO officials had said an accord had been reached on
allowing imports of generic versions of vital medicines by poor nations.
By Saturday, however, that deal also seemed imperiled because of a
dispute between U.S. and European negotiators over the U.S. insistence
on protecting pharmaceutical company patents by restricting generic
medicines to countries incapable of making their own drugs.

[snip]