ISDS Case Map
geopolitics
Trade with China is likely to become an increasingly politically sensitive issue for a number of countries on the continent. That is because China is essentially buying the continent's oil and minerals and selling back manufactured goods, a type of relationship redolent of a colonial one and similar to most of Africa's existing trade relations with Europe and the US.
In the economic field, imperialism's consternation with the slow pace of forging multilateral North-South agreements under the Doha round of meetings of the World Trade Organization have led to the more energetic push for bilateral Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs).
Ahead of Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit to New Delhi this month, security concerns about firms from his country investing in India is turning into a touchy issue.
The European relations with the Arab World can be regarded as a model that the US should follow. The evidence lies in the welcome of free trade agreements between the EU and Arab countries, and in the doubts about free trade agreements with the US.
The European Parliament has reaffirmed that Syria must respect democratic values and human rights before the Council of 25 EU member states could approve the EU-Syria Association Agreement that has been on ice for two years.
The Bush administration has a prescription for fighting coca growing, sidelining Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and saving thousands of jobs in Latin America: extending free trade for Andean nations.
BITs are generally crafted as political documents and quite often contain no mention of development. Western countries prefer to prioritize investment. If a development objective is involved, it is often generalized to the exclusion of any role for government.
Taiwan will continue to enhance economic ties with its Central American allies through either bilateral Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) or the "Jung Pang Project," President Chen Shui-bian said yesterday.
Long taken for granted by its much larger neighbors, Uruguay suddenly finds itself one of the main fronts in the struggle between the United States and Venezuela for dominance in South America. Washington is offering a free-trade agreement that would pull Uruguay into the United States' orbit and weaken Mercosur, the regional trade group to which Uruguay and Venezuela belong. Mr. Chávez has countered with attention-getting investments, subsidized oil, acts of charity and a growing alliance with left-wing factions of the ruling Broad Front.
At issue are commodities as varied as rice, apparel and automobiles, as well as lucrative new markets in banking and other financial services, with potentially billions of dollars in commerce at stake. But for several countries negotiating trade pacts with the US, the outcome may have less to do with economics than with American election-year politics.
