August 14, 2020: A short but growing list of countries are now signing pre-order contracts with pharmaceutical manufacturers for possible COVID-19 vaccines, which could leave behind most of the world’s population in 2021.
August 12, 2020: The Japanese Foreign Minister, Toshimitsu Motegi, and the UK Trade Secretary, Liz Truss met in person in London last week to finalise the proposed UK-Japan Free Trade Agreement, Media reports said that the major issues were settled and Secretary Truss expected the deal to be finalised by the end of August. The UK also wants FTAs with the EU, Australia, the USA, and New Zealand.
August 10, 2020: The Australia-Singapore digital economy text was signed last week and the text is available here. Australia announced the conclusion of negotiations in March but as usual the text has only been released after signing.
August 6, 2020: Darell Leiking, Malaysia’s former minister of international trade and industry and MP for Penampang has confirmed that on November 29, 2019, the government decided that it had made the right decision in not ratifying the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). This was based on a one-year research effort, which had found potential negative impacts on domestic industry.
August 4, 2020: AFTINET’s submission to the DFAT five-year post-implementation review of ChAFTA is here. A summary is below.
AFTINET criticised the lack of human rights and labour rights in China when ChAFTA was first proposed. Trade and diplomatic tensions between China and Australia have since increased in the context of the US-China trade wars. However, some cooperation continues through international institutions like the WHO and the WTO, which is essential in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. AFTINET will not be drawn into cold war rhetoric but will continue our criticism of the lack of human rights and labour rights in China, and of those provisions in the ChAFTA that are not in the interests of workers and communities in Australia and China.
August 3, 2020: The AFTINET submission to the Joint standing Committee on Treaties review is here, with a summary below.
July 29, 2020: It appears that the Japanese and British governments will not be sued by UK and Japanese corporations under the terms of a proposed free trade agreement which they want to conclude by January 1, 2021. That is when the United Kingdom is expected to finally break with the European Union, with or without a trade agreement.
July 28, 2020: Following a recent meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and an assessment of the outcomes of all India’s free trade agreements by the Commerce & Industry and Finance Ministries, the Indian government has created four working groups to develop a new trade strategy to boost foreign investment and expo
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Vaccines and WTO trade rules (TRIPS)
July 20, 2020: The Court of Justice of the European Union ruled on July 16 that EU data agencies must suspend data transfers to any country where the EU standards for data privacy cannot be met. It ruled that one particular arrangement, the US Privacy Shield, failed to meet the standards, and this has a direct impact on Facebook.