MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd November, 2018) The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum's economic leaders called on the APEC economies to expand their work within the framework of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in a statement, summarizing the outcome of the summit in Papua New Guinea.
"In order to improve the functioning of the WTO and to deliver for all its members, we commit to work together to improve its negotiating, monitoring and dispute settlement functions. We also encourage APEC economies to increase their participation in the WTO to advance its work," the statement released on Friday said.
The APEC ministers said in the document that they advocated WTO's well-coordinated operation, which would ensure non-discriminatory and transparent environment for the free trade.
According to the statement, the summit's participants have stressed the need to develop regional economic integration and noted the progress in the implementation of declaration on the Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP).
"We are committed to further actions to increase APEC's competitiveness in the services sector by 2025 and intensifying our efforts to address barriers and facilitate services trade that will better enable our businesses to compete or trade in services markets," the statement read further.
The 26th APEC economic leaders' meeting was held in Papua New Guinea's capital of Port Moresby on November 17-18. For the first time since 1993, the summit wrapped up without a formal joint declaration due to the disagreements on some controversial points caused by trade war between China and the United States.
