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WTO approves Russia's membership after marathon
Russia was admitted into the World Trade Organisation on Friday after 18 years of negotiation, finally binding it into the global economy two decades after the Soviet Union collapsed. Russia's $1.9 trillion economy was the largest outside the WTO, and accession will help reduce its dependence on energy exports that left it cruelly exposed to the oil price collapse of 2008. Accession by Russia, with the second-largest nuclear arsenal after that of the United States, into a rules-based club should also help limit dangers of a repeat of regional conflicts like its 2008 war with Georgia. Trade conflicts have repeatedly exacerbated tensions between Moscow and Tbilisi. "This result of long and complex talks is good both for Russia and for our future partners," President Dmitry Medvedev said in a message to a WTO ministerial meeting in Geneva that formally approved Russia's membership. Russia now has six months to ratify its membership and would become a member 30 days later. Even by the standards of trade talks, Russia's negotiations have been tortuous, suffering a series of reverses during the 12-year-old rule of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, now planning a return to the presidency he held from 2000-08. Negotiations were close to a result in 2009 when Putin, frustrated at additional demands from existing members, launched a regional trade bloc that torpedoed the accession process. Talks resumed in earnest only in late 2010 and achieved a critical breakthrough in October when Russia finalised terms with the United States and the European Union. Agreement on a Swiss-brokered border monitoring deal for two Georgian regions that broke away after a brief Russian-Georgian war in August 2008 cleared the final stumbling block to a deal. "I just happen to know a few things about marathons -- the last mile is the worst, the toughest," WTO head Pascal Lamy told a two-hour ceremony. "The best moment in a marathon is where you cross the finishing line." Posted by: tipper 2011-12-17 |
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