~ Le Viêt Nam, aujourd'hui. ~
The Vietnam News

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Hanoi 'flexible' in WTO talks

Vietnam has vowed to push for final talks on its accession to the World Trade Organization by showing "appropriate flexibility'' in the negotiations. ``The workload of talks on WTO entry is huge and complicated,'' said Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung in a report to the National Assembly in Hanoi. Dung set out the government's tasks as ``quickly finalizing plans for talks, increasing the number of staff essential for the negotiation teams and actively pushing negotiations, bilaterally and multilaterally, by maintaining our principles while having appropriate flexibility to end the talks soon.'' He did not set a target date Thursday for WTO entry, but Hanoi has made accession by the end of this year its goal.

Dozens of rules, laws and decrees need to be modified by the National Assembly to improve the legal system but the timeframe could now be too short. Vietnam started its transition to a market economy in 1986, but has long encountered criticism that it is moving too slowly. The country formally lodged its WTO application in January 1995. Its progress has since been hindered by factional fighting within the Communist Party, the 1997 Asian financial crisis and rampant corruption. Actual negotiations did not start until 2002.

Dung said Vietnam would quickly finalize 19 laws and three ordinances ``to facilitate international economic integration and WTO admission.'' Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, currently on a trip to Australia and New Zealand, had asked ``every ministry and sector to have specific programs on international economic integration,'' Dung said. Assembly chairman Nguyen Van An noted last week that Vietnam must pass at least 800 laws, but so far there are only 200 on the table. Former WTO director-general Mike Moore, who was in Hanoi recently, said overall accession talks are ``actually getting harder not easier'' than in the past as candidates for membership are now vetted more carefully since China's accession in 2001. ``This is very difficult,'' Moore said. ``This is not a done deal.''

Previous to that - and for the first time - Vietnam Trade Minister Truong Dinh Tuyen had admitted the country might have to give up on its ambition to join the WTO later this year due to the little progress made in negotiations. In Canberra, meanwhile, Vietnam's prime minister voiced strong support for Australia's desire to attend an inaugural East Asian summit while Australian host John Howard said Canberra would back Hanoi's entry into the WTO.

Phan Van Khai, described by Howard as a ``valued guest,'' was greeted by hundreds of protesters shouting ``Go Home!'' as he arrived at Parliament House for a welcoming ceremony. Many of the demonstrators arrived in Australia after Hanoi's victory in 1975. Australia now has 200,000 ethnic Vietnamese citizens.

Agence France Presse - May 06, 2005.