US in the spotlight at WTO meet
By AFP
March 26, 2026
WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala speaking at the ministerial conference in Yaounde - Copyright AFP -
Agnès PEDRERO
The United States is set to come under scrutiny Friday on day two of the World Trade Organization’s ministerial conference, with Washington wanting to shake up the multilateral trade system.
In the corridors of the WTO gathering in Cameroon’s capital Yaounde, which runs until Sunday, a lot of the talk is about the United States.
“The Americans are highly awaited; without them, we can’t move forward,” confided one delegate from a Southeast Asian country, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“The other members primarily expect the United States to clarify its intentions, and are asking it to demonstrate its continued commitment to the WTO through concrete actions,” Sebastien Jean, an associate director at the French Institute of International Relations think-tank, told AFP.
Yaounde marks the WTO’s first ministerial conference since US President Donald Trump returned to the White House last year, unleashing a barrage of attacks on multilateralism and WTO rules with sweeping tariffs and bilateral trade deals, violating WTO rules along the way, according to many experts.
Trump has made tariffs a central instrument of his economic and foreign policy.
“US trade policy measures are a corrective response to a trading system, embodied by the WTO, that has overseen and contributed to severe and sustained imbalances,” US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said Wednesday.
Under successive presidents, Washington is also accused of blocking the appointment of judges to the WTO’s Appellate Body — a mechanism for resolving trade disputes between countries — which has been paralysed since late 2019.
Many observers, however, are pleased that the United States has not quit the WTO, thus avoiding major upheaval in the international trading system.
– ‘Ultimatum’ –
The US position, however, seems rigid. Washington has issued two documents, the latest on Monday, on reforming the WTO, contesting some of its fundamental rules.
“The US is setting down an ultimatum, and that ultimatum is that the current global order no longer suits the objectives” of the White House, said Jane Kelsey, a law specialist from the University of Auckland, who came to the conference with a coalition of NGOs, experts and activists.
“And the US threatens to relegate the organisation to even greater irrelevance if it doesn’t get what it wants,” she told AFP.
“So that kind of threat is hovering over this ministerial.”
A chief US demand is revision of the WTO’s fundamental “most favoured nation” principle, which aims to extend any trade advantage granted to one country to all trade partners.
This system directly contradicts Trump’s approach to trade.
The United States also wants the WTO to establish criteria to determine whether a country should be considered as developing, given that such countries benefit from certain advantages in the way rules are applied.
Here, Washington is targeting China, which despite its economic heft is classified as a developing country at the WTO.
– Uncertainty in the air –
The United States also wants measures encouraging countries to be more open in reporting subsidies.
WTO members are required to do so, but again, Western countries accuse Beijing of lacking transparency.
Like many other members, the United States is also calling for the development of plurilateral agreements within the WTO, something India categorically rejects, preferring to stick with the current full consensus system.
Washington is also demanding that WTO rules do not infringe upon countries’ national “security”.
This demand is being met with resistance, as other countries think the concept remains vague when it comes to justifying, for example, additional tariffs.
But according to Sebastien Jean, “great uncertainty remains” about what the United States is seeking at the WTO.
“Is it reform to improve its functioning, or is it disorganisation, or even lasting paralysis?
“Recent statements by Jamison Greer suggest that they wouldn’t mind prolonging the uncertainty and paralysis” when it comes to institutional reform, he said.
“This could lead them to make very minimal concessions, on procedural points or on very specific issues.”
By AFP
March 26, 2026
WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala speaking at the ministerial conference in Yaounde - Copyright AFP -
Agnès PEDRERO
The United States is set to come under scrutiny Friday on day two of the World Trade Organization’s ministerial conference, with Washington wanting to shake up the multilateral trade system.
In the corridors of the WTO gathering in Cameroon’s capital Yaounde, which runs until Sunday, a lot of the talk is about the United States.
“The Americans are highly awaited; without them, we can’t move forward,” confided one delegate from a Southeast Asian country, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“The other members primarily expect the United States to clarify its intentions, and are asking it to demonstrate its continued commitment to the WTO through concrete actions,” Sebastien Jean, an associate director at the French Institute of International Relations think-tank, told AFP.
Yaounde marks the WTO’s first ministerial conference since US President Donald Trump returned to the White House last year, unleashing a barrage of attacks on multilateralism and WTO rules with sweeping tariffs and bilateral trade deals, violating WTO rules along the way, according to many experts.
Trump has made tariffs a central instrument of his economic and foreign policy.
“US trade policy measures are a corrective response to a trading system, embodied by the WTO, that has overseen and contributed to severe and sustained imbalances,” US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said Wednesday.
Under successive presidents, Washington is also accused of blocking the appointment of judges to the WTO’s Appellate Body — a mechanism for resolving trade disputes between countries — which has been paralysed since late 2019.
Many observers, however, are pleased that the United States has not quit the WTO, thus avoiding major upheaval in the international trading system.
– ‘Ultimatum’ –
The US position, however, seems rigid. Washington has issued two documents, the latest on Monday, on reforming the WTO, contesting some of its fundamental rules.
“The US is setting down an ultimatum, and that ultimatum is that the current global order no longer suits the objectives” of the White House, said Jane Kelsey, a law specialist from the University of Auckland, who came to the conference with a coalition of NGOs, experts and activists.
“And the US threatens to relegate the organisation to even greater irrelevance if it doesn’t get what it wants,” she told AFP.
“So that kind of threat is hovering over this ministerial.”
A chief US demand is revision of the WTO’s fundamental “most favoured nation” principle, which aims to extend any trade advantage granted to one country to all trade partners.
This system directly contradicts Trump’s approach to trade.
The United States also wants the WTO to establish criteria to determine whether a country should be considered as developing, given that such countries benefit from certain advantages in the way rules are applied.
Here, Washington is targeting China, which despite its economic heft is classified as a developing country at the WTO.
– Uncertainty in the air –
The United States also wants measures encouraging countries to be more open in reporting subsidies.
WTO members are required to do so, but again, Western countries accuse Beijing of lacking transparency.
Like many other members, the United States is also calling for the development of plurilateral agreements within the WTO, something India categorically rejects, preferring to stick with the current full consensus system.
Washington is also demanding that WTO rules do not infringe upon countries’ national “security”.
This demand is being met with resistance, as other countries think the concept remains vague when it comes to justifying, for example, additional tariffs.
But according to Sebastien Jean, “great uncertainty remains” about what the United States is seeking at the WTO.
“Is it reform to improve its functioning, or is it disorganisation, or even lasting paralysis?
“Recent statements by Jamison Greer suggest that they wouldn’t mind prolonging the uncertainty and paralysis” when it comes to institutional reform, he said.
“This could lead them to make very minimal concessions, on procedural points or on very specific issues.”
By AFP
March 27, 2026
The moratorium on e-commerce duty is a hot topic at the WTO's 14th ministerial conference - Copyright AFP Fabrice COFFRINI
Agnès PEDRERO
The future of digital taxes is dividing countries at the World Trade Organization, with the moratorium that has prohibited customs duties on electronic transmissions since 1998 front and centre in the debate.
The moratorium is highly important for developed countries — notably for the United States, which is calling for it to be made permanent rather than kept under regular review.
So far, only India has openly voiced disagreement with renewing the moratorium, according to several sources close to the discussions in Yaounde at the WTO’s ministerial conference, the organisation’s biennial supreme decision-making body.
“There is only one country that’s been vocally not supporting,” a Western diplomatic source told AFP.
“Normally, it’s kind of a handful of countries, whereas it’s only been one so far this time.”
But since decisions are made by consensus at the WTO, exerting pressure on this issue could be a way for India to gain concessions elsewhere.
– Software, cloud, telemedicine –
WTO members generally apply tariffs to imported goods and services, but in 1998, they agreed not to impose them on e-commerce.
“The rule is to have no tariffs on what circulates via the internet,” Valerie Picard, an official with the International Chamber of Commerce, who is attending the conference, told AFP.
“So when you download software, when an SME uses the cloud, when a freelancer sells a design service abroad, there are no taxes at the border,” she said.
“The moratorium applies to everything that is digital. It goes far beyond digital books and music. It also includes, for example, security updates, online courses, telemedicine,” she added.
From 1998 onwards, the temporary moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions has been renewed at successive WTO ministerial conferences.
However, discussions were particularly tense at the last ministerial meeting in 2024 in Abu Dhabi. At the last minute, India agreed not to veto an extension — but only for a maximum of two years.
In the absence of a common understanding on the scope, “the continued extension of this moratorium warrants careful reconsideration”, India’s commerce minister Piyush Goyal said Thursday.
The moratorium is set to expire on March 31, unless ministers in Yaounde decide otherwise.
The African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States at the WTO is proposing to keep the moratorium until the next ministerial conference.
The United States, supported by several countries including Japan, Mexico, Australia, Norway and Switzerland, wants to make the moratorium permanent.
“The United States is not interested in another temporary extension of the moratorium,” US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said Thursday.
– ‘Worst case’ scenario –
Approving an open-ended moratorium “will deliver stability and predictability for all traders”, while showing that the WTO can deliver results, said Joseph Barloon, the US ambassador to the organisation.
To limit opposition to the moratorium, the United States under President Donald Trump has negotiated a clause in recent bilateral agreements with certain countries, notably Indonesia.
“The worst case would, of course, be that we don’t have an extension of the moratorium. That’s something that we cannot exclude,” the Swiss WTO ambassador Erwin Bollinger said ahead of the conference.
Some developing countries are more reticent about the moratorium because they see it as a loss of tax revenue and argue that the rapid pace of digital transformation only exacerbates the problem.
According to a 2023 study published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the potential budgetary impact of the moratorium is limited, “amounting to, on average, 0.68 percent of total customs revenue or 0.1 percent of total government revenue”.
The OECD also noted that in most countries, the shortfall could be offset by increased VAT revenue from imports of digital services.
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