[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 34, Number 21 (Monday, May 25, 1998)]
[Pages 934-935]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Statement on the Conclusion of the World Trade Organization Meeting

May 20, 1998

    I am pleased and proud that the members of the World Trade 
Organization (``WTO'') have accepted my invitation to hold the 1999 WTO 
Ministerial meeting in the United States. This meeting will enable us to 
advance the ambitious agenda I laid out earlier this week to shape the 
world trading system to meet the challenges of the 21st century.

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Next year's meeting will bring home for Americans the important stake 
that we all have in the global economy. And I welcome the decision by 
the WTO to ask United States Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky to 
chair that meeting.
    In Geneva, we made important advances on our proposal to free the 
potential of electronic commerce. I am particularly pleased that the WTO 
members joined the United States in a standstill on any tariffs on 
electronic transmissions sent across national borders. We cannot allow 
discriminatory barriers to stunt the development of the most promising 
new economic opportunity in decades. This worldwide proposal builds on 
far-reaching agreements we reached within the last week with the 
European Union and Japan.
    As we build a trading system for the 21st century that honors our 
values and expands opportunity, we must do more to ensure that spirited 
economic competition among nations never becomes a race to the bottom--
in environmental protections, consumer protections, or labor standards. 
Without such a strategy, we cannot build the necessary public support 
for continued expansion of trade. I will work to ensure that the WTO and 
other international institutions are more responsive to labor, the 
environment, consumers, and other interests so that we can build the 
public confidence we need in our trade expansion initiatives.
    I want to thank Ambassador Barshefsky, Secretary Glickman, 
Ambassador Rita Hayes, our Ambassador to the WTO, and all the 
representatives of the U.S. business community and other participants in 
the Ministerial who worked to make this meeting a success.