For those of you familiar with the "a contrario" argument in relation to the SCM Agreement illustrative list, I thought this passage from the U.S. - Cotton Article 4.11 arbitration would be of interest:
4.161 Thirdly, we do not consider that there is any legitimate basis for us to accept the a contrario interpretation of item (j) proposed by the United States. Item (j) is illustrative of a situation in which the provision by governments of export credit guarantee programmes constitutes an export subsidy. In particular, item (j) specifies that export credit guarantee programmes constitute export subsidies when premium rates are inadequate to cover the long-term operating costs and losses of the programme. It does not necessarily follow, though, that an export credit guarantee programme may never constitute a (prohibited export) subsidy if the premium rates are adequate to cover long-term operating costs and losses. As a matter of law, it is possible that an item (j)-consistent export credit guarantee programme might still be found to confer a "benefit", on the basis of the standard set forth in Article 14(c) of the SCM Agreement.
If you have not heard of this argument before, you could either (1) consider yourself lucky and pretend I never mentioned it, or (2) go here for some more details.
