US, Canada and Mexico talks on NAFTA trade stall on trade deficit issues

http://www.dw.com/en/us-canada-and-mexico-talks-on-nafta-trade-stall-on-trade-deficit-issues/a-41004861

Date 17.10.2017

US, Canada and Mexico talks on NAFTA trade stall on trade deficit issues

US President Donald Trump's top trade official, Robert Lighthizer, along with his counterparts from Canada and Mexico, had been scheduled to unveil the end of the fourth round of negotiations on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) on Tuesday afternoon in Washington after a week of talks. In public, Mexican and Canadian officials have pointed to progress in areas like telecommunications, financial services and digital trade. But Mexico's Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said on Tuesday that the three countries had not found common ground and that the talks would not be concluded until 2018.

Canada later accused the US of sabotaging renegotiations with Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland saying the US was pursuing a "winner take all" approach. Lighthizer said he was "not focused on terminating NAFTA" and was trying to negotiate an update that "rebalances" the pact to reduce US trade deficits. He said other countries were struggling to accept that the US wanted to rebalance its trade agreements.
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Describing some of the US's demands as "ridiculously extreme," Moises Kalach, head of the international negotiating arm of Mexico's CCE business lobby, told Reuters that the US government knew it would not be able to push them through. "The key is to remain calm and see if the American government is ready to negotiate," Kalach told Mexican radio.
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