Japan to End Ban on Purchases of Satellites Made in Other Nations : Trade: Negotiators in Washington are said to be near agreement on easing another source of friction--curbs on imports of some U.S.-milled wood products.

Japan agreed Tuesday on the major elements of an accord to end its longstanding ban on government purchases of foreign-made commercial satellites, but U.S. and Japanese negotiators said they still must iron out more details before the pact becomes final.

Under the proposal, Tokyo will obtain all future commercial satellites through open, “non-discriminatory” bidding instead of protecting its domestic satellite manufacturing firms. Only government purchases of research-related satellites would remain closed.

Japan also agreed to revamp plans for its proposed CS-4 communications and weather satellite--a potentially lucrative project from which foreign bidders had been barred--to allow non-Japanese firms to bid.

The revamped version of the CS-4 proposal will force the Nippon Telephone & Telegraph Co., Japan’s private telephone giant, to go to the private market to buy the satellite services that it otherwise would have received from the CS-4. U.S. firms will be able to bid on those.

There was no immediate estimate of how much the deal would provide in potential sales for American satellite-makers. The typical satellite runs between $200 million and $650 million. Japan currently has some 43 of these in space; about five are U.S.-made.

Completion of the formal accord, which negotiators said could come by late April, would represent the second of three narrow--but politically important--trade disputes that the two sides have settled in recent weeks.

On March 23, the two governments came to terms on a pact ending Japan’s previous ban on government purchases of foreign-made supercomputers. And they reportedly are moving toward resolution of a third barrier that limits imports of U.S.-milled wood products.

All three issues were targeted by the Bush Administration last year as “priority” trade disputes. Unless all three are resolved by mid-June, the White House will be under pressure to impose retaliatory trade sanctions on Japan.

The announcement came as high-level negotiators continued broader talks here on the so-called Structural Impediment Initiative, designed to alter fundamental economic and business practices in both countries to help pare America’s $49-billion trade deficit with Japan.

Although negotiators on both sides insisted that the SII talks are still making progress, U.S. officials said the negotiations were dragging on longer than had been expected because of differences over details of the basic accord.

Today, two special emissaries sent by Japanese Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu--Nobuo Matsunaga, a former Japanese ambassador to the United States, and Hisashi Owada, the deputy foreign minister--are scheduled to meet with President Bush on the SII talks.

Later in the day, the two sides hope to issue an “interim report” that is expected to form the basis for stepped-up negotiations before the final deadline for the negotiations in mid-July. The talks, unprecedented in their scope, have been under way since last summer.

The new policy on satellites that Tokyo has pledged to adopt would allow government agencies and major Japanese telecommunications and broadcast companies to buy foreign-made satellites for the first time. It would not apply to satellites used for government research and development.

It would not apply to satellites that either test new technology or conduct government scientific research for under government aegis.

The specifics that U.S. negotiators want to nail down would enable American and other non-Japanese satellite makers to bid for purchases of commercial satellites by Japan’s NHK television network for use in rebroadcast operations.

Final details are expected to come in an exchange of letters between the two sides. The talks had been bogged down for months but were revived by the Japanese government after Bush and Kaifu specifically mentioned satellites at a meeting March 2-3 at Rancho Mirage.