Obama, Santos to clear way for free trade deal

Juan Manuel Santos © AFP Stan Honda

AFP

WASHINGTON (AFP) – President Barack Obama and his Colombian counterpart Juan Manuel Santos are set to approve a deal Thursday removing the final obstacles to a bilateral free trade agreement (FTA), US officials said.

Ron Kirk, the US trade representative, said the plan will lay out steps to protect labor rights in Colombia, clearing the way for ratification of the trade pact later this year.

“We are now in a position to announce an agreement on an ‘Action Plan Related to Labor Rights’ that outlines a number of steps that Colombia has agreed it will undertake,” Kirk said in a conference call with reporters.

Santos was in New York on Wednesday and was due at the White House Thursday, when he and Obama are expected to sign the action plan.

“We are very close to (reaching) a definitive agreement,” Santos told reporters in New York. “If we do so tomorrow we will then have a concrete date for the presentation of the FTA to Congress, which was our goal.”

The agreement should eliminate the final barrier to a free trade agreement signed by the two countries in 2006 during the administration of George W. Bush, but which has languished in the US Congress.

Santos noted that “Colombia has been waiting five years” for the FTA to become a reality, and that “in no way” would there be new negotiations on the treaty.

Democrats have blocked ratification of the FTA, raising concerns about attacks on union leaders in Colombia and demanding greater protections for labor organizers and labor rights.

Among other points, the plan requires a reform of the Colombian penal code by June 15 to criminalize actions that violate labor rights, and the assignment of 95 investigators to those kinds of cases by December.

Kirk said the plan “significantly expands the protection for labor leaders and union organizers, it bolsters efforts to hold accountable and punish those who have perpetrated violence against union members, and makes a number of important steps to strengthen labor laws and their enforcement.”

Some steps must be taken before the administration sends the treaty to Congress, others before the Congress votes, and yet others over the course of the year, he said.

The White House said the free trade agreement will expand US exports to Colombia by more than $1.1 billion, giving key US goods and services duty-free access to sectors ranging from manufacturing to agriculture.

“It will increase US GDP by $2.5 billion and support thousands of additional US jobs,” it said in a statement.

Top Senate Republican Mitch McConnell said an agreement would be “very good news for an economy that needs it.”

“Republicans have been urging the administration to act on this critical trade deal for months,” McConnell said on the Senate floor.

“This agreement would help American businesses compete on a level playing field with businesses overseas. It would help create American jobs. And it would help our relationship with an important ally in Latin America,” he said.

Kirk would not discuss a timetable for FTA ratification, which officials said would involve two other FTAs awaiting approval — one with South Korea and another with Panama.

The US administration, which did not push negotiations on those three fronts during its first two years in office, changed course late last year, when Obama said he wanted to reach a trade deal with South Korea.

Kirk announced an agreement with Seoul in December, and since early this year has reported major progress on labor and tax issues with Panama.

But Republicans, after taking control of the US House of Representatives, said the fates of the three treaties were inseparable, and that they all had to be submitted for ratification by July 1.

Tensions in Congress between Democrats and Republicans also led to suspension of other agreements, such as a system of trade preferences for Andean nations in effect since 2002, which benefited Ecuador and Colombia.

© AFP — Published at Activist Post with license