Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 13 • Number 32 • 23rd September 2009

Palestinians Seek Observership Status at the WTO

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The Palestinian Authority is seeking observership status at the WTO, and a delegation of Palestinian officials is in Geneva this week in an attempt to drum up support for their bid.

“We are here to lobby and request a status of an observership in the general council and all associated bodies of the WTO,” said Palestinian economy minister Bassim Khoury, who is heading the delegation, according to Agence-France Presse. “We do that because we dream of an eventual full accession to WTO,” he added.

The Palestinian officials have met with a range of WTO members this week, including the US, the EU, China and Japan, and have also sat down with WTO Director General Pascal Lamy and Ambassador Mario Matus of Chile, the chair of the WTO’s General Council.

“Yes, we are optimistic,” says Dr. Ibrahim Khraishi, the Palestinian Authority’s ambassador to the United Nations. He noted that technically there are no obstacles to the bid, as the WTO allows both states and customs territories to become observers to the organisation, or even full members. Current non-state members of the WTO include Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.

So far this week, the Palestinian delegation has gotten “very positive” reactions, Khraishi said, although he added that the Israelis “are still without any clear position.”

The Palestinians plan to make their official bid at a meeting of the WTO’s General Council scheduled for 20 and 21 October. As with most WTO business, the matter will be decided by a consensus vote of the organisation’s 153 members.

Twenty-nine states, plus the Vatican, are currently classified as observers to the WTO. The organisation’s rules require observers - with the exception of the Vatican - to start negotiating the terms of their full WTO membership within five years of attaining the status.

ICTSD reporting; “Palestinians want support for WTO observer status bid,” AGENCE-FRANCE PRESSE, 22 September 2008.