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Joint Effort Against U.S.

The international internet gambling disputes to the World Trade Organisation against the United States are apparently far from over. Late last year (2007) the United States and the European Union came to compensation agreements concerning the amount of trade allowances that the U.S. would give the EU compensation for withdrawing online gambling trade obligations from an international trade agreement. And even though the EU settled the compensation negotiations, the EU could join two other nations in a pending dispute. Both Costa Rica and Antigua have requested new arbitration from the WTO concerning the online casinos gambling dispute.

Costa Rica has a large online casinos gambling industry that was affected by the U.S. withdrawal of trade obligations and restrictions in the foreign internet gambling industry. For that reason, Cost Rica and Antigua have announced they will team up to ask the WTO for arbitration and compensation from the United States.

The tricky part of the situation is that the EU could decide to join in on the compensation requests once again even though the EU and U.S. came to compensation agreements, the agreements did not bind the EU from reopening the negotiations.

The U.S.’s decision to withdraw commitments from previous trade agreements has been met with skepticism and concern all over the world, and many question the WTO’s ability to effectively handle the situation and online casinos compensation negotiations. Basically, if the U.S. does not honor the decision that the WTO comes to than the integrity and power of the WTO come into question.

The former Director of Policy Planning for U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick, Nao Matsukata, recently commented on the situation that WTO could face if negotiations go south. He notes, "The decision by Antigua and Costa Rica to take the United States to arbitration will test the limits of the WTO process and squarely challenge the U.S. resolve to withdraw its GATS commitments."