Lamy tells WTO to speed up Doha talks for 2010 goal

By Jonathan Lynn

GENEVA (Reuters) - World Trade Organisation members will fail to meet their latest deadline of 2010 for completing the Doha round to open global commerce if they do not speed up their work, the head of the trade body said on Tuesday.

WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy said countries were making some progress in the latest intensive negotiations in Geneva in areas such as facilitating trade and the technical work necessary to implement an eventual deal in agriculture.

"But I also believe it will be difficult to get to 2010 without a serious acceleration of the pace," Lamy said.

"We need to see real negotiations emerge, not only informal consultations and discussions, but real exchanges among members," the Frenchman told the WTO's General Council.

Leaders of the G20 rich and emerging countries called at their summit in Pittsburgh last month for the Doha round, now in its eighth year, to be completed in 2010.

That was the latest in a series of calls to finish the longest running trade round, launched in late 2001 to open markets and help developing countries prosper through trade.

AMERICA'S ROLE

But the high-level political exhortations have not been matched by compromise and movement in the Geneva talks, leading many to question whether the leaders are sincere in their call for real negotiations.