POKER ROOM REVIEW NEWSWIRE

Public Citizen Sues to Force U.S. Trade Office To Release Details of WTO Internet Gambling Deal

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Bush administration is illegally withholding the details of its offer accepted by the European Union to bind more sectors of the U.S. economy to World Trade Organization (WTO) jurisdiction as part of a settlement relating to a WTO ruling against the U.S. ban on Internet gambling, Public Citizen contended today in a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

After a 2007 WTO ruling authorized trade sanctions because the United States had failed to conform U.S. gambling law to WTO rules, the Bush administration announced it would remove the gambling sector from WTO coverage. But to do so, WTO rules require that the U.S. must negotiate compensation for other WTO countries. Although it has announced that deals have been reached with the European Union and other countries, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) has refused to release the details of its compensation agreements. In December, the USTR provided a hint at the scope of the deals by revealing that they involved new U.S. WTO commitments for “warehousing services, technical testing services, research and development services and postal services relating to outbound international letters.”

“Americans have a right to know what kinds of trade concessions the U.S. government is granting other countries, especially when those deals have a significant impact on domestic policy and may be worth billions of dollars,” said Bonnie I. Robin-Vergeer, a Public Citizen attorney. “The Bush administration’s decision to withhold the agreement under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) has more to do with its desire to prevent public and congressional scrutiny of the settlement before it is enshrined in a new WTO schedule than it does with national security. FOIA requires the agreement’s release.”

The suit asks the court to find that the USTR is illegally withholding the settlement agreement and to order the agency to provide Brayton a copy of the agreement.