November 2007
At the recent WTO Public Forum CIEL hosted a discussion on the problem of an increasingly fragmented legal framework. WTO Members have been largely unsuccessful in negotiating explicit multilateral solutions on coherence, shifting some
of the responsibility to dispute settlement panels and the Appellate Body. Clarity is needed in order to foster coherence between the WTO, multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs), regional trade agreements, and other bodies of law (including human rights and labor). CIEL harshly criticized the WTO Panel’s approach in the EC-Biotech case — which categorically rejected
the EC’s request to consider the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Biosafety Protocol — and argued that WTO panels and the Appellate Body cannot ignore major international environmental agreements when interpreting WTO law. While CIEL agreed that new obligations pursuant to international environmental agreements should not be imposed upon Members via the WTO, CIEL stressed that WTO rules should not hinder its Members from fulfilling their obligations under other international agreements, especially when this is possible through treaty interpretation.
A report of the session is available in PDF format.