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| Sunday,13 November 2005 |
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APEC talks on bird flu & terrorism 6BUSAN, South Korea, Nov 12 (AFP) - Asian and Pacific countries held talks Saturday focusing on the troubled state of global trade talks, attempts to prevent a bird flu pandemic and efforts to combat terrorism. Officials from the 21 members of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum met in the South Korean city of Busan to prepare for next week's summit bringing together world leaders such as US President George W. Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao. Thousands of police have been deployed around the conference venue and at sensitive sites such as the airport and train station to prevent terrorist attacks and contain protests by farmers and anti-globalisation activists. Officials who attended Saturday's opening talks said participants were working on a statement stressing the importance of progress at the December 13-18 World Trade Organisation talks in Hong Kong. Trade talks are deadlocked over subsidies to farmers in the rich nations of the European Union and the United States, and WTO secretary general Pascal Lamy warned this week that the goals of the Hong Kong meeting should be lowered. A senior Southeast Asian official who attended Saturday's talks said APEC leaders wanted to make a strong political statement giving a final push for progress before the WTO meeting. "There's a general feeling that there will be no breakthrough in Hong Kong because the Europeans are not giving in on agriculture," the official told AFP, asking to remain anonymous.APEC officials were also due to discuss bird flu. The H5N1 strain of the virus has killed more than 60 people since 2003, but experts fear it could mutate into a more lethal strain that could cause a global pandemic. Another official involved in Saturday's talks said discussions would focus on how APEC countries would respond to a pandemic and plans for an APEC-wide mock exercise simulating a human-to-human outbreak. Plans for the exercise were agreed at an APEC meeting in Australia last month but no date was set. According to a draft APEC initiative, leaders will call for intensified preparations for a pandemic in line with World Health Organisation guidelines and plans to protect commerce in times of crisis. A third APEC official said following the latest bombings in the Jordanian capital Amman, which killed at least 57 people and were blamed on the Muslim militant group Al-Qaeda, terrorism would also be discussed Saturday. The APEC forum was launched in 1989 with the goal of establishing a free trade area among its members by 2020, but in recent years its agenda has been expanded to include pressing global issues such as terrorism and public health. |
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