EC Leads Effort to Lift Tuna Ban

In what environmentalists say is a landmark case, the European Community and two dozen other countries Tuesday attacked a U.S. embargo on tuna imports that is intended to protect dolphins.

The EC and the non-European governments asked the ruling council of the 103-nation General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade to adopt a report that opposes the embargo.

The world trade body must adopt the report in order for it to have legal force.

“We want the United States to abide by international law,” said an EC spokesman in Brussels.

The United States put an embargo into effect early last year against countries, including Mexico and Venezuela, whose tuna fishing fleets it said are killing too many dolphin.

Later it placed a secondary embargo on Italy, France, Spain and Britain--all members of the 12-nation EC--for importing tuna from those countries.

The dispute is one of the hottest cases before the GATT. Environmentalists are concerned that GATT will try to prohibit countries from adopting environmental measures on grounds that they go against free trade.

“It is a landmark case,” said Samuel LaBudde, biologist with the Earth Island Institute, which sued to force the U.S. government to implement the tuna embargo under the U.S. Marine Mammal Protection Act.

Mexico brought the GATT case against the United States last year but, apparently eager not to damage trade negotiations with Washington, it has not sought to have the report opposing the embargo implemented.

The EC, Venezuela, Argentina, Peru, Bolivia, Colombia, Brazil, Canada, Thailand, Japan, Sweden and Australia are among those Tuesday saying the report should be adopted.

The council said it will study the issue instead of making an immediate decision on the report.

U.S. Ambassador Rufus Yerxa noted that the U.S. government fought the secondary trade embargo, but a court had ordered it implemented.

Yerxa indicated that probably the only way in the near term to stop the embargo is for Congress to reverse the legislation.

Most of the delegations said the best way to protect the dolphin is through an international agreement.

“The best way to solve this problem is to stop putting nets around dolphins,” LaBudde said. “It’s that simple.”