“If the accession dossier will be ready, we will submit at the coming ministerial conference of the WTO, otherwise it will be for next year,” the minister told the press on the sidelines of a meeting of the National Commission in charge of the negotiations for Algeria’s accession to WTO.

According to him, Algeria accession to this Organization does not face any major obstacle and it’s in the “last stage.”

“We have achieved several stages since the beginning of WTO talks on the accession. Today we are really in the last stage,” stressed Benyounes.

Since the holding of the last round of multilateral negotiations in Geneva in March 2014, Algeria received 131 additional questions that are examined by the various ministries.

“I think this is the last question” sent to the country, he added.

Concerning the meeting of the National Commission in charge of the negotiations for Algeria’s WTO accession, held Tuesday behind closed doors in the presence of representatives of several ministries, Benyounes said that it focused on the examination of the answers to the questions of the United States and the European Union (EU) notably.

Those questions mainly concern the Algerian law and its compliance with the WTO rules.

Once the answers approved, they will be transmitted to the government committee responsible for monitoring and supervision of Algeria accession to WTO, which is chaired by Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal. He will decide definitively on these answers.

“Later, we will probably schedule a multilateral meeting in Geneva in June,” added Benyounes.

So far, Algeria has conducted 12 rounds of multilateral negotiations that have treated more than 1,900 issues related to national economic system.

Source: bloomberg.com