February, 20 2014, 01:00pm EDT

For Immediate Release
Contact:
Alisa Simmons (202) 454-5111
Lori Wallach (202) 454-5107
Public Citizen Publishes Checklist of Outstanding TPP Issues That Require Resolution for a Deal to Be Made
Familiarity with kabuki theatre may be useful in interpreting the outcomes of the high-level Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) meeting that starts Feb. 22 in Singapore as U.S. officials push for an announcement of a "deal" with the hope of reviving the administration's quest for Fast Track trade authority and setting the stage for President Barack Obama's April 2014 Asia trip, Public Citizen said today.
WASHINGTON
Familiarity with kabuki theatre may be useful in interpreting the outcomes of the high-level Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) meeting that starts Feb. 22 in Singapore as U.S. officials push for an announcement of a "deal" with the hope of reviving the administration's quest for Fast Track trade authority and setting the stage for President Barack Obama's April 2014 Asia trip, Public Citizen said today.
"There is a sense that whether or not any real deal is finalized, there may be an announcement of one, if only to portray the talks as not unraveling despite growing opposition to the TPP in some of the countries involved," said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch. "An announcement also could be a ploy to try to pressure Congress on trade authority and maximize President Obama's leverage when he visits Japan."
A bilateral U.S-Japan ministerial meeting last weekend failed to break a deadlock on sensitive agricultural and auto market access issues. Other TPP nations are loath to consider tradeoffs relating to U.S. demands on medicine patents, copyright, state-owned enterprises, financial regulation and other issues on which they face considerable domestic political liability without knowing what market access gains they may achieve in return. A TPP ministerial slated for January was postponed because of the market access deadlock.
"People who follow the TPP closely are baffled about why this meeting is happening," said Wallach. "Either it is an attempt to improve the optics surrounding the beleaguered talks by announcing some deal, whether or not one is done, or they are afraid that already having postponed this ministers' meeting once, canceling it would signal that the talks were unraveling."
Deal vs. kabuki checklist: To actually have a TPP deal, these issues must be resolved:
Disciplines Against Currency Manipulation
A TPP without binding currency provisions could be dead on arrival in Congress. The other TPP nations know this but still oppose such terms. While 230 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and 60 U.S. senators have written to Obama demanding currency manipulation disciplines in the TPP, U.S. negotiators haven't initiated negotiations on this, much less secured terms. Among others, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a prominent supporter of past pacts, announced he would oppose the TPP if it does not include enforceable currency disciplines.
Enforceable Labor and Environmental Standards
As a January text leak revealed, all other TPP nations oppose many TPP Environment Chapter terms that the United States demands. This includes obligations that, if nations fail to enforce certain environmental agreements that they have signed, they will face TPP enforcement and trade sanctions. Other U.S. bottom lines that face unified opposition are a ban on trade in illegally harvested timber and endangered species, with violations subject to trade sanctions, and enforceable disciplines on fisheries subsidies. Among the TPP countries are those that have led unwavering opposition to disciplines on fishery subsidies, including in the context of the World Trade Organization. More broadly, the other countries have to date rejected the U.S. demand that both the environment and labor chapters be enforceable and subject to the same dispute resolution system as other TPP chapters. These are terms that Congress forced President George W. Bush to include in his pacts. If the Obama administration rolls back the labor and environmental terms included in Bush-signed agreements, it will lose almost all Democratic congressional support for the TPP. In addition, if the labor standards were enforceable, it remains unresolved how the TPP could include Vietnam, one of four countries cited by the Department of Labor for using both child and forced labor in apparel production.
State-Owned Enterprises
After years of deadlock during which countries could not even agree on a text from which to negotiate, substantive talks are now under way. However, to complete a deal, either the United States will have to roll back its demands, which would be extremely unpopular in Congress, or a bloc of TPP countries with numerous state-owned enterprises could have to make major concessions.
Intellectual Property Chapter Patent and "Transparency" Text on Medicine Pricing Rules
Most other TPP countries continue to oppose U.S. proposals to expand the scope of patentability, including terms that would promote evergreening, subject surgical procedures to monopoly patents and extend data exclusivity terms that would deliver on Big Pharma's demands for monopoly powers that raise medicine prices. The powerful American pharmaceutical industry has declared that it will oppose the TPP if the pact reverses extreme provisions in past U.S. Free Trade Agreements (FTAs). A sizeable bloc in Congress has stated that it will oppose the TPP if such terms are included. Another contested issue is the U.S. proposal for a cynically dubbed "Annex on Transparency and Procedural Fairness for Healthcare Technologies" that would allow drug firms to challenge medicine formulary reimbursement and pricing decisions. The target ostensibly was the national health care systems in New Zealand, Australia and other TPP nations that use formulary lists to reduce health care costs. Grassroots and legislator opposition to the U.S. proposal is virulent, making concessions on this issue politically perilous. Big Pharma insists that these terms must extend beyond those contained in the U.S.-Australia FTA. Meanwhile, an increasing number of U.S. state officials and Democratic congressional supporters of the Affordable Care Act also oppose those terms, which could undermine enhanced use of formularies to reduce U.S. health care costs.
Copyright Extensions
Hollywood- and recording industry-inspired proposals that would greatly extend copyright durations, limit innovation, restrict access to educational materials and force Internet providers to act as "copyright police" by cutting off people's Internet access (think of the SOPA/PIPA debacle) have triggered public outrage in numerous TPP countries, leading to a negotiation stalemate. The United States has continued to demand that the TPP be used to require countries to adopt domestic copyright terms beyond international norms and aggressive copyright and enforcement provisions that would limit the public domain and Internet freedoms. A bloc of countries remains solidly opposed to various elements of these demands. There also is entrenched disagreement about whether copyright should be able to keep works of art and literature out of the public domain for 70 years after death of the author. No resolution is in sight.
Financial Regulation and Capital Controls
With the International Monetary Fund endorsing the use of capital controls to avoid floods of speculative capital that cause financial crises, it's no surprise that there is united opposition among other TPP countries to a U.S. demand that the TPP include a ban on the use of various commonsense, macro-prudential measures, including capital controls and financial transactions taxes. While the United States has objected to an exception allowing the use of such measures, other TPP nations have stated they will not agree to a TPP that prohibits the use of such measures.
Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS)
Australia has maintained an exception to being submitted to ISDS, which elevates individual corporations to equal status with sovereign nations and allows them to enforce a public treaty by "suing" national governments for compensation before international tribunals comprised of private-sector attorneys over claims that government actions undermine their expected future profits. The National Conference of State Legislatures, the body representing the 50 U.S. state legislative bodies, has adopted a policy of opposing any trade agreement with investor-state enforcement. The United States is demanding all countries submit to this system. Even those TPP nations that have agreed to investor-state enforcement oppose the U.S. demand that government natural resource concessions, private-public-partnership utility management contracts and procurement contracts be subject to such extra-judicial processes. The other countries also oppose a U.S. demand that the investor-state terms apply "pre-establishment" - creating a right to investment, including acquisition of land. The United States has consistently opposed an exception supported by most other TPP nations that would safeguard domestic environmental, health and other policies from the TPP tribunals.
Mechanism for the TPP to Go into Effect
Agreement on the legal mechanisms required for implementing the TPP has proven extremely elusive. A standard provision in the implementing legislation of past U.S. trade agreements requires that, after the U.S. Congress ratifies the pact, the president withhold formal written notification of that approval from partner countries until the president certifies that the partner countries have altered their own laws and policies to comply with the trade deal. That is to say, even after both the United States and its trade partners have ratified an agreement, it takes effect only after the United States unilaterally certifies that its partners have changed domestic laws according to U.S. demands. TPP nations argue the certification process gives the U.S. government and corporations enormous leverage to force them to conform to American interpretation of trade agreement terms - some of which are often deliberately vague, opaque and contentious. This process also often delays implementation of agreements.
Sensitive Market Access Issues
Agriculture: Japan's parliament has listed five "sacred" commodities that must be excluded from TPP tariff-zeroing: rice, beef/pork, wheat, sugar and dairy. The United States, Australia and other TPP nations have rejected these exclusions. Australia wants U.S. access for its sugar exports, a demand that the United States rejected in its bilateral FTA with Australia. The United States has declared it will not negotiate new market access with countries with which it already has FTAs - in no small part to avoid the wrath of the politically powerful U.S. sugar industry, which has strong support among Democrats and Republicans in Congress. New Zealand's main TPP demand is increased access to American and Canadian markets for its massive dairy export industry. But with dairy farmers in many U.S. congressional districts, a large bloc of Democrats and Republicans strongly oppose this demand. Yet, despite its refusal to negotiate market access with its current FTA partners, the United States has demanded access for dairy products in Canadian markets - a condition it couldn't secure in the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and that Canada has also rejected for the TPP.
Autos: The U.S. Congress insists that Japan be subject to a special bilateral agreement providing certain additional concessions relating to auto trade, insurance and access for U.S. beef. While the Abe administration agreed to this demand, the bilateral pact - a U.S. condition for Japan being included in a final TPP deal - has not been finalized, with negotiations on auto trade issues especially mired.
Government Procurement: The United States wants national government contracts above a set threshold be made available to firms from all TPP countries on equal terms. But many Democratic and GOP members of Congress oppose any waiver of Buy American preferences, which would be required to implement this rule. The U.S. demand has also raised broad opposition in Malaysia, where its "bumiputera policy" - which guarantees a portion of government procurement contracts go to ethnic Malays - is key to preventing a recurrence of violent attacks against the country's ethnic Chinese population, which dominates its business sector. Other TPP nations want the United States to guarantee that their firms will get the same access to the 50 U.S. states' procurement activities as they would provide to U.S. firms, which U.S. negotiators have refused.
Apparel and Shoes: Vietnam has insisted on duty-free access for its clothing made with inputs from China and other non-TPP nations, and the elimination of U.S. tariffs on footwear. The "rule of origin" Vietnam requests would reverse a long-standing "yarn forward" rule included in past U.S. pacts to support U.S. jobs. If honored, Vietnam's demand would increase the uncertainty that Congress would approve the TPP.
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that champions the public interest in the halls of power. We defend democracy, resist corporate power and work to ensure that government works for the people - not for big corporations. Founded in 1971, we now have 500,000 members and supporters throughout the country.
(202) 588-1000LATEST NEWS
National Team Member Becomes at Least 265th Palestinian Footballer Killed by Israel in Gaza
Muhannad al-Lili's killing by Israeli airstrike came as the world mourned the death of Portugal and Liverpool star Diogo Jota and his brother André Silva in a car crash in Spain.
Jul 04, 2025
Muhannad Fadl al-Lili, captain of the Al-Maghazi Services Club and a member of Palestine's national football team, died Thursday from injuries suffered during an Israeli airstrike on his family home in the central Gaza Strip earlier this week, making him the latest of hundreds of Palestinian athletes killed since the start of Israel's genocidal onslaught.
Al-Maghazi Services Club announced al-Lili's death in a Facebook tribute offering condolences to "his family, relatives, friends, and colleagues" and asking "Allah to shower him with his mercy."
The Palestine Football Association (PFA) said that "on Monday, a drone fired a missile at Muhannad's room on the third floor of his house, which led to severe bleeding in the skull."
"During the war of extermination against our people, Muhannad tried to travel outside Gaza to catch up with his wife, who left the strip for Norway on a work mission before the outbreak of the war," the association added. "But he failed to do so, and was deprived of seeing his eldest son, who was born outside the Gaza Strip."
According to the PFA, al-Lili is at least the 265th Palestinian footballer and 585th athlete to be killed by Israeli forces since they launched their assault and siege on Gaza following the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel. Sports journalist Leyla Hamed says 439 Palestinian footballers have been killed by Israel.
Overall, Israel's war—which is the subject of an International Court of Justice (ICJ) genocide case—has left more than 206,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing, and around 2 million more forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened, according to Gaza officials.
The Palestine Chronicle contrasted the worldwide press coverage of the car crash deaths of Portuguese footballer Diogo Jota and his brother André Silva with the media's relative silence following al-Lili's killing.
"Jota's death was a tragedy that touched millions," the outlet wrote. "Yet the death of Muhannad al-Lili... was met with near-total silence from global sports media."
Last week, a group of legal experts including two United Nations special rapporteurs appealed to the Fédération Internationale de Football Association, the world football governing body, demanding that its Governance Audit and Compliance Committee take action against the Israel Football Association for violating FIFA rules by playing matches on occupied Palestinian territory.
In July 2024, the ICJ found that Israel's then-57-year occupation of Palestine—including Gaza—is an illegal form of apartheid that should be ended as soon as possible.
During their invasion and occupation of Gaza, Israeli forces have also used sporting facilities including Yarmouk Stadium for the detention of Palestinian men, women, and children—many of whom have reported torture and other abuse at the hands of their captors.
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Highly Inspiring' Court Ruling Affirms Nations' Legal Duty to Combat Climate Emergency
"While the United States and some other major polluters have chosen to ignore climate science, the rest of the international community is advancing protections," said one observer.
Jul 04, 2025
In a landmark advisory opinion published Thursday, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights—of which the United States, the world's second-biggest carbon polluter, is not a member—affirmed the right to a stable climate and underscored nations' duty to act to protect it and address the worsening planetary emergency.
"States must refrain from any conduct that reverses, slows down, or truncates the outcome of measures necessary to protect human rights in the face of the impacts of climate change," a summary of the 234-page ruling states. "Any rollback of climate or environmental policies that affect human rights must be exceptional, duly justified based on objective criteria, and comply with standards of necessity and proportionality."
"The court also held that... states must take all necessary measures to reduce the risks arising, on the one hand, from the degradation of the global climate system and, on the other, from exposure and vulnerability to the effects of such degradation," the summary adds.
"States must refrain from any conduct that reverses, slows down, or truncates the outcome of measures necessary to protect human rights in the face of the impacts of climate change."
The case was brought before the Costa-Rica based IACtHR by Chile and Colombia, both of which "face the daily challenge of dealing with the consequences of the climate emergency, including the proliferation of droughts, floods, landslides, and fires, among others."
"These phenomena highlight the need to respond urgently and based on the principles of equity, justice, cooperation, and sustainability, with a human rights-based approach," the court asserted.
IACtHR President Judge Nancy Hernández López said following the ruling that "states must not only refrain from causing significant environmental damage but have the positive obligation to take measures to guarantee the protection, restoration, and regeneration of ecosystems."
"Causing massive and irreversible environmental harm...alters the conditions for a healthy life on Earth to such an extent that it creates consequences of existential proportions," she added. "Therefore, it demands universal and effective legal responses."
The advisory opinion builds on two landmark decisions last year. In April 2024, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the Swiss government violated senior citizens' human rights by refusing to abide by scientists' warnings to rapidly phase out fossil fuel production.
The following month, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea found in an advisory opinion that greenhouse gas emissions are marine pollution under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and that signatories to the accord "have the specific obligation to adopt laws and regulations to prevent, reduce, and control" them.
The IACtHR advisory opinion is expected to boost climate and human rights lawsuits throughout the Americas, and to impact talks ahead of November's United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP30, in Belém, Brazil.
Climate defenders around the world hailed Thursday's advisory opinion, with United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk calling it "a landmark step forward for the region—and beyond."
"As the impact of climate change becomes ever more visible across the world, the court is clear: People have a right to a stable climate and a healthy environment," Türk added. "States have a bedrock obligation under international law not to take steps that cause irreversible climate and environmental damage, and they have a duty to act urgently to take the necessary measures to protect the lives and rights of everyone—both those alive now and the interests of future generations."
Amnesty International head of strategic litigation Mandi Mudarikwa said, "Today, the Inter-American Court affirmed and clarified the obligations of states to respect, ensure, prevent, and cooperate in order to realize human rights in the context of the climate crisis."
"Crucially, the court recognized the autonomous right to a healthy climate for both individuals and communities, linked to the right to a healthy environment," Mudarikwa added. "The court also underscored the obligation of states to protect cross-border climate-displaced persons, including through the issuance of humanitarian visas and protection from deportation."
Delta Merner, lead scientist at the Science Hub for Climate Litigation at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said in a statement that "this opinion sets an important precedent affirming that governments have a legal duty to regulate corporate conduct that drives climate harm."
"Though the United States is not a party to the treaty governing the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, this opinion should be a clarion call for transnational fossil fuel companies that have deceived the public for decades about the risks of their products," Merner added. "The era of accountability is here."
Markus Gehring, a fellow and director of studies in law at Hughes Hall at the University of Cambridge in England, called the advisory opinion "highly inspiring" and "seminal."
Drew Caputo, vice president of litigation for lands, wildlife, and oceans at Earthjustice, said that "the Inter-American Court's ruling makes clear that climate change is an overriding threat to human rights in the world."
"Governments must act to cut carbon emissions drastically," Caputo stressed. "While the United States and some other major polluters have chosen to ignore climate science, the rest of the international community is advancing protections for all from the realities of climate harm."
Climate litigation is increasing globally in the wake of the 2015 Paris climate agreement. In the Americas, Indigenous peoples, children, and green groups are among those who have been seeking climate justice via litigation.
However, in the United States, instead of acknowledging the climate emergency, President Donald Trump has declared an "energy emergency" while pursuing a "drill, baby, drill" policy of fossil fuel extraction and expansion.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump Admin Quietly Approves Massive Crude Oil Expansion Project
"This thinly analyzed decision threatens the lifeblood of the American Southwest," said one environmental attorney.
Jul 04, 2025
The Trump administration has quietly fast-tracked a massive oil expansion project that environmentalists and Democratic lawmakers warned could have a destructive impact on local communities and the climate.
As reported recently by the Oil and Gas Journal, the plan "involves expanding the Wildcat Loadout Facility, a key transfer point for moving Uinta basin crude oil to rail lines that transport it to refineries along the Gulf Coast."
The goal of the plan is to transfer an additional 70,000 barrels of oil per day from the Wildcat Loadout Facility, which is located in Utah, down to the Gulf Coast refineries via a route that runs along the Colorado River. Controversially, the Trump administration is also plowing ahead with the project by invoking emergency powers to address energy shortages despite the fact that the United States for the last couple of years has been producing record levels of domestic oil.
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) and Rep. Joe Neguse (D-Colo.) issued a joint statement condemning the Trump administration's push to approve the project while rushing through environmental impact reviews.
"The Bureau of Land Management's decision to fast-track the Wildcat Loadout expansion—a project that would transport an additional 70,000 barrels of crude oil on train tracks along the Colorado River—using emergency procedures is profoundly flawed," the Colorado Democrats said. "These procedures give the agency just 14 days to complete an environmental review—with no opportunity for public input or administrative appeal—despite the project's clear risks to Colorado. There is no credible energy emergency to justify bypassing public involvement and environmental safeguards. The United States is currently producing more oil and gas than any country in the world."
On Thursday, the Bureau of Land Management announced the completion of its accelerated environmental review of the project, drawing condemnation from climate advocates.
Wendy Park, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, described the administration's rush to approve the project as "pure hubris," especially given its "refusal to hear community concerns about oil spill risks." She added that "this fast-tracked review breezed past vital protections for clean air, public safety and endangered species."
Landon Newell, staff attorney for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, accused the Trump administration of manufacturing an energy emergency to justify plans that could have a dire impact on local habitats.
"This thinly analyzed decision threatens the lifeblood of the American Southwest by authorizing the transport of more than 1 billion gallons annually of additional oil on railcars traveling alongside the Colorado River," he said. "Any derailment and oil spill would have a devastating impact on the Colorado River and the communities and ecosystems that rely upon it."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular