Taiwan poised for February WTO entry, official says

Barring any unexpected developments, Taiwan will formally become a member of the WTO on Feb. 1, a senior official said yesterday.

Wu Wen-ya (吳文雅), director of the Ministry of Foreign Trade (MOFT), made the remarks before leaving for Shanghai to attend an informal meeting of senior officials of the APEC forum.

Despite current concerns about terrorism, Wu said the WTO has not given any hints to suggest it might change the schedule of its ministerial meeting slated for Nov. 9 to Nov. 13 in Qatar.

Wu said the Geneva-based trade regulatory body is expected to formally approve Taiwan and China's WTO membership bids at the November meeting as the relevant WTO working parties already endorsed their accession terms in September.

"Once the WTO ministerial meeting passes Taiwan's WTO membership application, our Legislative Yuan must approve all the promises we have made, including the passage of 19 related legislative bills," Wu said.

As the legislature will suspend operations in November to allow incumbent legislators to focus on the Dec. 1 elections, Wu said the screening of the WTO-related bills is not expected to be finalized until the end of this year.

According to WTO regulations, Taiwan must present all of the endorsed bills and other relevant documents to the WTO Secretariat before becoming a formal member 30 days after the presentation of all of these protocols.

"So if all goes well, we'll be able to enter the WTO as a full member on Feb. 1," Wu said.