Hillary Rodham Clinton |
By Kim Hyun-cheol
Staff Reporter
It was confirmed Wednesday that U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton had sent President George W. Bush a message saying she will not support a free trade agreement (FTA) with South Korea, ahead of a similar letter sent by Democratic contender Barack Obama.
Clinton, along with 11 other Democratic senators, accused South Korea of being a ``repeat offender'' in trades with the United States and urged the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to take trade-laws-based measures against countries like Korea and China before pursuing FTAs with them.
The legislators also accused Susan Schwab, the trade representative, of asking U.S. firms to lobby lawmakers for support of the U.S.-Korea FTA.
``South Korea has a long history of blocking American goods,'' said the letter posted on Inside World Trade, a trade journal, on Monday. ``Despite repeated memoranda of understanding with the United States, it has continued to use ever-changing standards to keep American products ― from autos to apples to appliances ― out of its market.
``We simply cannot support another trade agreement ahead of enforcing our trade laws, improving product safety, and ensuring a level playing field for our businesses and workers,'' it said.
Skepticism is growing regarding whether the FTA's will be finalized this year as the Bush administration hopes, particularly with the presidential election getting ever closer. The Democrat-controlled Congress has already handed the White House a severe blow by delaying a vote on an FTA with Colombia indefinitely.
Both Clinton and Obama have consistently criticized the trade pact. The New York State Senator said the agreement was ``inherently unfair'' and would in the end increase U.S. trade deficit, rob middle class people of decent jobs and make America less competitive.
Obama, the current leader in the Democratic presidential campaign, sent Bush a letter, dated Thursday and released on Friday, in which he demanded the president not submit the ``badly flawed'' FTA to Congress for a vote claiming the terms of the pact ``fall well short of assuring effective, enforceable market access for American exports of manufactured goods and many agricultural products.''
South Korea and the United States signed the FTA last year, the biggest trade pact for the United States since the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994.
hckim@koreatimes.co.kr
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