Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma has said India will not “rush to” the World Trade Organization (WTO) over the “regressive” steps taken by the US recently, which include an increase in the visa fee and a special levy on foreign manufacturers.

COLONIA, Uruguay: La Paz urged Seoul Wednesday to reopen its market to Uruguayan beef, and agreed to back South Korea's bid to negotiate a free trade deal with its Mercosur trade bloc partners.The request came during a visit by South Korean Prime Minister Kim Hwang-sik, who did not address the media.Uruguayan authorities are keen to end the South Korean ban on beef from the South American nation imposed in 2001 after a foot-and-mouth disease outbreak.

UK - Europe should rely less on direct farming subsidies and reward farmers more for their environmental efforts and the other work they do to enhance the countryside, Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman said today.Mrs Spelman, who will speak at the Oxford Farming Conference today, said that the new Common Agricultural Policy, currently being negotiated and to be in place from 2014, needed to be fundamentally different.

The European Union is not about to lift its embargo on arms sales to China despite increased trade, a diplomat said."There remains a broad consensus within the EU that the time is not right to lift the arms embargo. We need to see clear progress on the issues that necessitated the embargo in the first place, namely on civil liberties and political rights," a British diplomat told EU observer Tuesday.The embargo was imposed after the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989.

The issue about import duties changing or their temporary cancellation for rye and buckwheat imports should be considered in the long-term prospects, due to the fact that the changes may need to come to agreement with all the countries-participants of the World Trade Organization (WTO).The opinion was announced by Oleg Malskiy, the partner of the International Juridical Group AstapovLawyers, while commenting the initiative of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine to impose the zero duties for the above stated commodities groups.

BUENOS AIRES (Hollywood Reporter) – Brazil is taking extra steps to protect its film industry even as the homegrown movie "Elite Squad 2" just became the country's most popular film ever, surpassing "Avatar" in the process.A new presidential decree, signed a day before outgoing President "Lula" da Silva delivered office to Dilma Roussef on Saturday, increases the screen quota for exhibition of local films in all Brazilian theaters.

One of the biggest beneficiaries of China’s rapid economic ascent is not China at all, but rather its historic rival, occasional enemy and fellow socialist neighbor to the south, Vietnam.Less than a decade ago, many economists and executives believed that China’s allure was creating a “giant sucking sound” of investment that could be heard in distant Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

BRASILIA (AFP) - – South Korea on Sunday raised the possibility of a trade deal with South American trade bloc Mercosur at a meeting between Prime Minister Kim Hwang-Sik and new Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, her foreign minister said.The South Korean delegation "spoke about the hypothesis of a Korea-Mercosur free trade agreement," Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota told reporters after the meeting.Rousseff, who was sworn in Saturday as Brazil's first female president, met with Kim on her first full day in office.

The New Zealand-Hong Kong Closer Economic Partnership Agreement (CEP) came into force on Saturday, making cuts to remaining New Zealand tariffs.Trade Minister Tim Groser said both countries had completed the necessary legislative measures and the agreement took effect January 1.New Zealand goods currently entering Hong Kong at a zero tariff will now be bound at that level. The CEP also paves way to further progressive reductions, which will mirror those in the New Zealand-China Free Trade Agreement.

Pakistan typically exports about $10 billion of textile products each year, with about a quarter of that amount going to U.S. retailers.The United States has spent billions of aid dollars on Pakistan, but more than nine years after the country joined the global fight against terrorism, the U.S. government remains unable to provide its strategic ally with one thing it really craves: easier access to the U.S. market for its T-shirts, towels and socks.