The long-running Doha trade talks have finally started to move after a constructive week of talks among key powers that grappled with issues of substance, the US envoy to the World Trade Organisation said on Thursday.
The comments, by US ambassador Michael Punke, were one of the strongest signs yet that an intensified push to conclude the decade-old negotiations this year were finally bearing fruit.
"My sense is that we're finally starting to do the things we need to do, which is grapple with the really hard issues," Punke told Reuters after a week of meetings among 11 major WTO members including the United States. "We're in a mode right now where we're talking about substance."
Negotiators have been meeting over the past few weeks since trade ministers called last month in Davos for an outline deal by the middle of July, and said they would instruct their negotiators to do what it takes to reach necessary compromises. The meetings this week of the 11 economies - Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, the EU, India, Japan, Mauritius, South Africa and the United States - are part of the intensified efforts.