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Biosafety
protocol talks to resume in September Montreal 4 Jul -- The stalled negotiations for an international biosafety protocol to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) are to resume in September this year in Montreal. Governments attending the Intersessional Meeting of the CBD, in informal consultations on the sidelines of this meeting, agreed to resume the stalled negotiations. While no firm dates have been set, it is expected that the resumed talks could be held 16-21 September. The informal consultations were chaired by Colombia's Environment Minister, Mr. Juan Mayr, who had chaired the Cartagena meeting earlier this year. There will be two days of formal consultations on the biosafety protocol, preceded by three days of informal consultations between and within the major groups. The negotiations for international safety regulations covering the safe handling, use and transboundary movement of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) were to have been concluded in Cartagena in February this year. But the negotiations broke down when the three major groups conducting the negotiations failed to reach an accord on most of the key issues. The same three groups are now expected to be involved in the September talks. These are: the 'Miami group' consisting of the United States, Canada, Australia, Argentina, Chile and Uruguay, a 'like-minded group' which includes all developing countries except those in the 'Miami group', and the European Group. The renewed negotiations are expected to be tough and prolonged. The informal consultations also agreed that in addition to the talks in September, there will be a further final meeting in February/March 2000. The need for an international biosafety protocol has been underscored (since the February Cartagena meeting) by the high- profile that trade in GMOs have assumed - with more and more of consumers and public in Europe, and now even in the United States, turning against GMOs and GMO-embedded products. The GMO issue and trade in these products figured in the agenda of the Cologne G-8 summit, whose leaders have remitted it to a lower-level committee in the OECD (hoping perhaps that public and media concerns and adverse analysis and comments would abate). Also, the European Union has issued a de facto moratorium on release of GMOs in Europe, and these are expected to be finalised and issued next year by the EU Council of Ministers. (SUNS4471) The above article first appeared in the South-North Development Monitor (SUNS). [c] 1999, SUNS - All rights reserved. May not be reproduced, reprinted or posted to any system or service without specific permission from SUNS. This limitation includes incorporation into a database, distribution via Usenet News, bulletin board systems, mailing lists, print media or broadcast. For information about reproduction or multi-user subscriptions please contact < suns@igc.org >
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