The European Commission Defends Investor State

I mentioned that, having taken the EU side on issues related to regulatory trade barriers, I would criticize the EU soon, to make sure that this blog is "fair and balanced". So here goes. The European Commission has posted a short document in which it defends investor state

The Canada-EU Trade Agreement is Here! Almost!

I've been excited to look at a number of aspects of the Canada - EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), including regulation, investment and IP.  So I was excited to see the news reports this week that it was almost done.  Then today there were headlines like this:

More on US-EU Regulatory Trade Issues

Following-up on my post last week about the dueling U.S./EU speeches on "regulatory trade barriers", here's an excerpt from an op-ed we wrote on these issues: ... The EU focus on tackling existing and future regulatory divergences, as opposed to domestic regulatory reform,

Death Penalty Export Restrictions

From a recent news report: Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon on Friday halted what was to have been the first U.S. execution to use the popular anesthetic propofol, following threats from the European Union to limit the drug's export if it were used for that purpose. Nixon also

Why Governments Bring WTO Complaints

Via Benn McGrady, here's an op-ed from trade lawyer Simon Lacey explaining his advice to the Indonesian government on whether to file a WTO complaint against Australia's plain packaging law: A few months ago I was asked to provide a legal opinion on whether or

Dueling Speeches on Regulatory Trade Barriers

A couple weeks ago, I mentioned the different views of the US and EU on how the TTIP talks should deal with regulatory issues. Now we have dueling speeches by the head trade officials of each side. In a nutshell, as set out by US Trade Representative Mike Froman, the

The (Almost) Final EU Tobacco Rules

We talked about the EU's proposed Tobacco Products Directive here, here, and here.  The EU measure is moving ahead, and here are some details about what they will be doing: - The sale of cigarettes in packets of 10 is expected to be banned by 2016 - Menthol cigarettes are

The Independence of the Judicial Branch of the WTO

Among the reasons I was positive about the choice of Roberto Azevedo as WTO DG was his extensive experience with the dispute settlement process in the WTO, perhaps its most important and certainly most successful function today.  I was very surprised by a recent report in an Indian newspaper that

How Broad is a Right to Use Trademarks?

Another conversation I had in Geneva was about the Plain Packaging case and the right to use trademarks.  We've talked about this issue on this blog before.  Do trademark holders have a right to use those trademarks?  Or simply a right to prevent others from using a similar

What is "Trade" in Services?

Last week, I was at the WTO public forum, talking about online higher education.  One of the themes was that putting education online makes education tradable like it never has been before. I had been assuming that online education would fall within the GATS as trade in services, but someone