TWN Info Service on WTO and Trade Issues (Jul26/11)
17 July 2026
Third World Network

Trade: US & allies press WTO members on plurilateral e-com moratorium
Published in SUNS #10484 dated 17 July 2026

Geneva, 16 Jul (D. Ravi Kanth) -- The United States and its allies are pressing World Trade Organization members to join an apparently illegal plurilateral initiative to permanently waive customs duties on electronic transmissions - "with the aim of eventually securing a multilateral commitment, building upon that which had been consistently agreed upon by all Members since 1998," said people familiar with the development.

The push comes after Washington failed to secure consensus on its preferred four-year extension of the moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions.

As a result, the US hastily cobbled together a coalition of countries and declared that it would proceed with a plurilateral arrangement - bypassing the core procedural requirements set out in paragraph 9 of Article X of the Marrakesh Agreement that established the WTO in 1995, according to several trade envoys.

Paragraph 9 of Article X of the Marrakesh Agreement explicitly states: "The Ministerial Conference, upon the request of the Members parties to a trade agreement, may decide exclusively by consensus to add that agreement to Annex 4. The Ministerial Conference, upon the request of the Members parties to a Plurilateral Trade Agreement, may decide to delete that Agreement from Annex 4."

Yet on 26 May, the US and its allies chose to sidestep these stipulated conditions and instead unilaterally announced their arrangement - an act several trade envoys, speaking on condition of anonymity, described as a flagrant violation of the WTO rules.

Worse still, in what is supposed to be a rules-based organization, the US, the European Union, and several other developed countries now appear to be embracing a dangerous new playbook: turning the 166-member global trade body into "a lawless arena" where violations go unpunished, according to trade envoys who declined to be named.

PUSH BY US & ALLIES

Against this backdrop, the co-sponsors of the US-led initiative - Argentina, Australia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Iceland, Israel, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, North Macedonia, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Singapore, Switzerland, Chinese Taipei, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Uruguay - have ironically positioned themselves as the pioneers of controversial plurilateral and interim arrangements, circumventing the very rules they claim to uphold.

Expressing "disappointment" with the lack of consensus, the US and its allies signaled that they remain "committed to do what we can to provide to businesses and consumers a measure of predictability and certainty in the absence of the multilateral E-Commerce Moratorium."

In their communication (WT/GC/W/286/Rev.3), the co-sponsors pointedly avoided clarifying whether they would accept the standard two-year extension of the moratorium or a four-year extension that the US had pushed for at the WTO's 14th ministerial conference (MC14) in Yaounde, Cameroon.

Instead, they proposed a self-devised workaround: "beginning on 8 May 2026, we, the co-sponsors of this communication, will continue to not impose customs duties on electronic transmissions among ourselves. For the purposes of this communication, "electronic transmission" means a transmission made using any electromagnetic means and includes the content of the transmission."

One trade envoy, who requested anonymity, questioned the logic: "If they are fine with their stated arrangement, then why appeal for other members to join their controversial pact?"

Further confusion persists over the reference to the 1998 agreement on the moratorium - renewed every two years since - and whether Washington is now willing to accept a two-year extension of the moratorium instead of the four-year extension that it was seeking, according to people familiar with the development.

Seeking to broaden the pact's reach, the co-sponsors stated that they would "encourage all WTO Members who seek the benefits of trading under these stable conditions to join this commitment at any time with the aim of eventually securing a multilateral commitment, building upon that which had been consistently agreed upon by all Members since 1998." +