Colombia’s Uribe fails to secure Democrats’ backing for free trade deal
The Associated Press
14 November 2006
Colombia’s Uribe fails to secure Democrats’ backing for free trade deal
President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia, on a visit hastily arranged after Democrats took control of the U.S. Congress, failed to secure promises from American lawmakers that they would back passage of a much-scrutinized trade deal.
Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel, in line to be the next chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, would not comment on his meeting Tuesday with Uribe. With a visibly tense Uribe looking on, Rangel said it was up to the new Congress to "review" the Bush administration’s trade deal with Colombia. "Everything is possible," he said.
Uribe arrived Monday to press for the deal, Washington’s biggest in the hemisphere since the North American Free Trade Agreement of 1994, amid speculation it could be scuttled once Democrats take control of Congress in January.
In what could be a sign of a fiery legislative battle over trade, Bush administration trade officials insisted they would push for swift passage of trade deals reached this year with Peru and Colombia, its staunchest ally in Latin America.
Under fast-track trade legislation that expires in July, and which Democrats are unlikely to renew, Congress cannot modify - only ratify or reject - trade deals negotiated by the White House.
House and Senate staffers say Democrats are concerned the Bush administration’s thirst for free trade could be jeopardizing American jobs. The conservative Uribe government has also drawn criticism from Democrats for not doing enough to protect trade unionists from violence by the country’s illegal armed groups.
Rangel said he raised the issue of Colombia’s labor record with Uribe, but he refused to provide further details. The International Labor Organization has called Colombia’ the world’s deadliest country for labor organizers.
Instead of a trade deal that would permanently remove tariffs on $14.3 billion (€11.15 billion) in annual trade, Colombia may have to settle for unilateral trade preferences.
In line with the wishes of the White House, Rangel and other Democrats want to extend long-standing trade benefits for four drug-producing Andean nations - Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru - that are due to expire Dec. 31.
Uribe also asked for renewal of those benefits, known as the Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act (ATPDEA). But he wants them as a stopgap measure until the trade deal is voted on by Congress sometime next year.
Uribe said Monday that Colombian textile companies have already slashed 7,000 jobs this year in anticipation of being slapped Jan. 1 with 20 percent tariffs.
The Colmbian bilateral trade deal is expected to signed Nov. 22 in Washington. Congressional staffers said the deal signed in April with Peru has a better but still slim chance of being enacted before year’s end if the outgoing Republican leadership holds a lame duck session in December.
Although Peru is still publicly seeking passage this year, the economist Hernando de Soto, sent as an envoy by President Alan Garcia to lobby for the accord, said Monday that his country was willing to modify the accord to placate Democrats’ concerns.
In contrast, Uribe has refused to budge, saying the multiyear negotiations that wrapped up in February between the two countries were a matter of long-term state policy.
"Renegotiating is not a possibility," his foreign minister, Maria Consuelo Araujo, said Monday.
Deputy U.S. Trade Representative John Veroneau, who met with Uribe Monday, said in a statement that the administration would push Congress to approve "at the earliest possible date" the Colombian and Peruvian trade deals as well as the extension of ATPDEA.
In addition to lobbying Washington, Uribe has struggled at home to sell Colombians, especially farmers, on the benefits of trade pact that he claims will usher in a foreign investment boom and create 380,000 new jobs within a few years.
