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food safety | SPS
The South Korean government will put new U.S. beef import terms into effect as early as this week, officials said on Monday, signaling a full resumption of imports, which have been suspended for nearly five years.
South Korea has been seeing nightly mass demonstrations for over a month, a candlelight march of 1 million people on June 10 and a strike wave of key industrial unions. All are connected to a trade agreement between Washington and the current government of President Lee Myung-bak that would allow US beef into the country.
Labor movement will lead candlelight protests for renegotiation of US beef agreement, KCTU says
On June 10th, around one million people and workers gathered to demand renegotiation of US beef import agreement across the country. In case of Seoul, around 500,000 people participated in the candlelight vigil and march.
South Korean unions on Tuesday threatened a general strike in protest of a US beef import deal, as negotiators in Washington tried to find a way out of the crisis shaking the Seoul government.
Talks between the United States and South Korea over the resumption of American beef imports ended Sunday without any agreement, US Trade Representative spokeswoman Gretchen Hamel said.
The Daiichi Sankyo-Ranbaxy Laboratories deal has come as a shot in the arm for India's Comprehensive Economic Co-operation Agreement (CECA) negotiations with Japan. Indian pharma companies have been unable to break into Japan, the world's second largest drug market, due to the country's stringent sanitary and phytosanitary standards, technical barriers to trade (TBT) and environmental norms.
Korean middle school student Chae-song Kim asks that the trade agreement be reconsidered
To the rest of the world, South Korean protests over the safety of US beef are portrayed as an expression of simmering anti-Americanism. Without a doubt, anti-American sentiments have historical roots. But Koreans also have a legitimate claim to fear the safety of US beef.
US Ambassador Alexander Vershbow said Thursday the United States and South Korea will come up with a solution to the ongoing controversy over Seoul's decision to resume imports of American beef thorough "additional understandings"' to their deal signed in April. Vershbow, however, ruled out renegotiating the deal, saying it could damage the national interests of the two countries ― including the possible failure to ratify the Korea-US Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
