RI-Japan EPA final draft turned into legal document
Antara News, Indonesia
RI-Japan EPA final draft turned into legal document
9 July 2007
Tokyo (ANTARA News) - Indonesian and Japanese legal consultants at the end of last week finished processing the final draft of the planned Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between the two countries, a diplomat said.
The exercise turned a "record of discussion" signed last June by officials from the two countries into a legal document, the trade attache at the Indonesian embassy in Tokyo, Tulus Budhianto, said here on Monday.
The legal consultants put all the agreements reached during negotiations between delegations from the two countries into formulations and wordings in accordance with prevailing legal language, he said.
They did their work from July 3 to 5, 2007 at the Japanese foreign affairs ministry office in Tokyo.
The same document will be discussed further in Jakarta in mid- July 2007.
Indonesian and Japanese delegations in Tokyo last June 22, 2007, signed a "record of discussion" document as the EPAs final draft.
The Indonesian delegation during the five-day negotiations held at the Japanese foreign ministry building in Tokyo, was headed by senior diplomat Soemadi Brotodiningrat, while the Japanese delegation included Japanese Deputy Foreign Minister for Economic Affairs Masaharu Kohno.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhyono are expected to sign the EPA in August 2007, in Jakarta during Abes planned visit to Indonesia.
The Japanese leader is scheduled to visit Jakarta from August 19 to 21, 2007, as part of his Asian tour which will also take him to India and Malaysia.
Under the EPA, Indonesia will be able to export its farm as well as manufactured products to Japan as the latter will cut import tariffs on the products by up to 90 percent or scrap them within 15 years. In exchange, Indonesia will also cut or scrap import tariffs on Japanese products in stages within the next 15 years.
In the trade and services sector, Indonesia is expected to scrap import tariffs on a number of Japanese automotive products by the year 2012, and on commercial-purpose vehicles by 2016.
