960428

EU, Japan to hold

trade talks

in Brussels

BRUSSELS: Trade chiefs from Japan and the European Union will meet on Monday with more than half an eye cast towards Geneva where talks on opening the world's telecommunications markets are reaching a climax.

Official statements before the first ministerial meeting between the two trading powers since 1994 suggested that there was an underlying buoyancy to a previously more troubled relationship.

"As a whole, EU-Japan bilateral trade relations have substantially improved," said a European Commission trade paper issued ahead of the meeting between Japanese Foreign Minister Yukihiko Ikeda and EU Trade Commissioner Sir Leon Brittan.

The talks, to be preceded by a working dinner on Sunday, will involve other EU commissioners and Japan's International Trade and Industry Minister Shunpei Tsukahara and Economic Planning Minister Shusei Tanaka.

High on the agenda will be discussions on deregulation, trade in cars and car parts, investment, agriculture, construction and financial and legal services.

European Commission figures for trade between the EU's 15 member countries and Japan put the 1985 balance at $12.8 billion in Tokyo's favour out of a two-way trade flow of $33.2 billion.

Figures for 1995, while showing a balance swollen to $21.4 billion in Japan's favour, said total trade was now worth $119 billion.

"There are not many contentious issues. The climate of our relationship with the EU is calm and positive," Atsushi Tokinoya, Japan's ambassador to the EU, told reporters last week.

"The most important negotiations in the world in terms of trade are the WTO telecoms ones," he said referring to a Monday deadline for World Trade Organisation talks in Geneva on opening telecommunications markets to foreign competition.

Nor did Tokinoya see many contentious issues between Japan and the United States aside from a dispute over whether to renew an existing semi-conductor trade agreement.

He said Japan had certain reservations about EU involvement in any replacement for the 1991 market-opening deal. Japan has repeatedly said the agreement should lapse in July while the United States wants it renewed.-Reuter