Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei

28/08/2013

 

 

The Civil Society stakeholders for the Brunei round of TPP negotiations are very disappointed that no formal report from the Chief Negotiators was presented, nor the opportunity for stakeholders to ask questions in a forum where all could hear the answers. 

 

At this round of TPP negotiations the stakeholder session ended with a mingling of negotiators with stakeholders in a stand-up format. While we found the negotiators to be friendly and open to questions, the setting did not enable many stakeholders to ask their questions and the answers given were not available to everyone.

 

There were a number of questions we would liked to have heard answers to, of these the most pressing are:

 

The Civil Society represented at the Brunei round consisted of a number of NGOs and community organisations who have very limited resources.  To come to a negotiation round and not be able to question Chief Negotiators is a huge disappointment.

 

We continue to urge for greater transparency and accountability, and we ask again for the release of a draft negotiating text.

 

Signed:

 

Hadyn Green

Consumer NZ

 

Yoshiko Matsuda

What is TPP?

 

Trish Hepworth

Australian Digital Alliance

 

Patricia Ranald

Australian Fair Trade and Investment Network

 

Yasuaki Yamaura

Consumers Union of Japan

 

Yasuo Kondo

People's Action Against TPP (Japan)

 

Krista L. Cox

Knowledge Ecology International