US Rep Dingell Pushes To Amend South Korea Free-Trade Pact
By Josh Mitchell, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- A senior U.S. House member introduced a measure
Thursday pushing to reopen talks on a U.S.-South Korea free-trade pact, renewing
complaints that the pending deal doesn't fully open the South Korean market to
American-made autos.
Rep. John Dingell (D., Mich.) introduced the resolution on a day that
President Barack Obama concluded an Asian trip by pledging to ratify the free-
trade agreement with South Korea.
The deal's auto section is viewed as a main obstacle to U.S. congressional
approval of the pact.
Dingell, the U.S. auto industry's top ally on Capitol Hill, said the deal
would perpetuate "Korean discriminatory treatment of imported U.S. automobiles."
"Congress should insist that the free-trade agreement between our two
countries remedy this patently unbalanced state of affairs," Dingell said in a
statement.
Dingell said his resolution calls for an amendment to the trade pact that
would provide "positive incentives for Korea to open its market to U.S. autos,"
address South Korea's non-tariff barriers and create a mechanism for the U.S. to
take action against future non-tariff barriers.
U.S. officials in recent weeks have said they may want changes in the auto
section of the agreement, though they haven't announced specifics. South Korean
officials are reluctant to reopen the pact because of domestic political
pressure. They also note that auto tariffs in both countries evaporate upon
ratification and that there is a so-called snapback provision that allows the
U.S. to reimplement tariffs if it believes South Korea is violating the pact.
-By Josh Mitchell, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-6637; joshua.mitchell@
dowjones.com
(Jonathan Weisman, of The Wall Street Journal, contributed to this article.)
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
11-19-091607ET
Copyright (c) 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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