Trade concessions for Pakistan?

Britain and Denmark urge EU to grant trade concessions to Pakistan to help overcome flood devastation.

Britain and Denmark urged the European Union to grant trade concessions to Pakistan to help overcome the devastation caused by the floods.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague, after a meeting with his Danish counterpart Lene Espersen, said that they would be pushing the case at an EU summit in Brussels this week.

Hague said that Denmark and Britain are advocating that the EU should do more by giving unconditional market access to Pakistan.

Lene Espersen said that they need Pakistan to help develop a more stabilised economy in the long run, and this goes through more trade.

The EU has been divided on the issue but, spurred into action by the floods, now appears likely to grant concessions, which will above all boost market access for Pakistani textiles.

Britain and Germany, which both have thousands of troops fighting insurgents in neighbouring Afghanistan, back concessions, but southern European states with textile industries that compete with Pakistan's have blocked them.

EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels last Friday asked EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht to draw up a plan for approval by leaders at Thursday's summit that would seek a World Trade Organisation waiver worth at least 230 million euros ($292 million) for Pakistan, EU diplomats said.

Pakistan would also benefit from a review under way of the EU's Generalised System of Preferences-Plus (GSP+), a trade support mechanism, due to be completed in January, they said.

Hague said he did not believe trade concessions should be made conditional on Pakistan doing more to tackle militants.