Colombia, Chile complete second round of free trade talks
Xinhua | October 28, 2006
Colombia, Chile complete second round of free trade talks
Colombia and Chile on Friday completed the second round of their free trade talks, resulting in a deal to be signed by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe on Nov. 27 during a visit to Santiago.
The text of the agreement from the week-long talks in Colombia’s Caribbean coastal city of Barranquilla will be formally reviewed in Bogota on Nov. 13 and in Santiago on Nov. 20.
The leading negotiators, Colombia’s Eduardo Munoz and Chile’s Carlos Furche, said they were happy with the quick way the deal was discussed, adding that the agreement was basically an extension of their 1993 Economic Complementation Accord, which awarded preferential tariffs to 95 percent of goods produced by each nation.
Munoz, Colombia’s trade minister, said the two delegations had reached agreements on labor, market access, rules of origin, customs procedures, services, investment, animal hygiene and environmental protection.
The two countries held their first round of talks from Oct. 10 to Oct. 14 in Chile’s capital Santiago.
