The request was announced on the WTO’s website.
According to the WTO, the consultations give the parties anopportunity to discuss the matter and to find a satisfactory solutionwithout proceeding further with litigation. After 60 days, ifconsultations have failed to resolve the dispute, the complainant mayrequest adjudication by a panel.
The Vietnameserequest followed its failed attempts to protect domestic steelmanufacturers under the WTO’s General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade(GATT) and Agreement on Safeguards. This time, the Southeast Asiannation hopes to settle the dispute without the establishment of a WTOadjudication panel.
On July 7, 2014, theIndonesian Government issued a 3-year anti-dumping duty on flat-rolledproducts of iron or non-alloy steel imported from key supplier nations,including Vietnam, Taiwan and the Republic of Korea. Accordingly, theproducts face tariffs at 50 percent in 2014, 46 percent in 2015 and 41percent in 2016.
Vietnam has suffered greatly asthe country used to occupy as much as 60 percent of the Indonesianmarket for flat-rolled iron product imports. After the trade defencemeasure took effect, the Hoa Sen Group—Vietnam’s biggest exporter offlat-rolled products of iron, had to stop its shipments to Indonesia.-VNA