After news broke Wednesday that Antigua and Barbuda (Antigua) would join the European Union in seeking U.S. compensation via the World Trade Organization (WTO), U.S. trade officials reportedly said today that Japan will also join the complaint.
The Financial Times carries the report, though the paper does not make any further specifications as to what Japan will seek from the United States.
In October, Japan--along with China and the European Union--went to bat for Antigua in its WTO dispute with the United States over U.S. cross-border I-gaming restrictions. That is, each nation became a third party to the dispute.
Having reserved their third-party rights, representatives from each country were allowed to make a written submission to a WTO compliance panel. The written submission is a vehicle whereby each country or organization weighs in on the case. Japanese, Chinese and European representatives were also given separate meetings, in person, with the compliance panel.
In the present case, the European Union will seek "unspecified market access" for its services companies as compensation, a spokesman for EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mendelson told the FT.
Antigua will seek compensation through the suspension of its obligations regarding U.S. copyrights, trademarks, industrial designs and patents, worth an estimated $3.44 billion, annually.
An unnamed U.S. trade official told the FT that it would fight the claims by trading partners.
"We look forward to learning the basis upon which WTO members--who neither requested nor made WTO commitments on gambling and betting in the Uruguay Round and had no basis to believe that the United States had made such a commitment--intend to support their claims of interest."
However, the trade official was more conciliatory toward Antigua, saying that the U.S. Trade Representative's Office would continue to work with the Caribbean nation to find a "mutually satisfactory resolution" to the dispute.