SAFEGUARD MEASURES IN REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS LEGAL ISUES AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR VIETNAM

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF LAW -*** -MANAGING BOARD OF THE ADVANCED COURSES ĐOÀN THANH BÌNH SAFEGUARD MEASURES IN REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS – LEGAL ISUES AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR VIETNAM BACHELOR OF LAW THESIS Faculty: International Law Academic year: 2012 - 2016 HO CHI MINH CITY 2016 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HO CHI MINH CITY UNIVERSITY OF LAW -*** -MANAGING BOARD OF THE ADVANCED COURSES ĐOÀN THANH BÌNH SAFEGUARD MEASURES IN REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS – LEGAL ISUES AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR VIETNAM BACHELOR OF LAW THESIS Faculty: International Law Academic year: 2012 - 2016 Supervisor: LLM Nguyễn Thị Lan Hương Student in charge: Đồn Thanh Bình Student code: 1253801012270 Class: CLC 37A HO CHI MINH CITY 2016 DECLARATION This thesis has been written in partial fulfilment of the Bachelor of Law Program at Ho Chi Minh City University of Law The ideas and opinions expressed in this paper are made independently, represent my own views and are based on my own research I confirm that this work is my own and has not been submitted for academic credit in any other subject or course I have acknowledged all material and sources used in this paper ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Ms Nguyen Thi Lan Huong for her dedicated support of my research Without her wise guidance, patience, and encouragement, it would not be possible for me to complete this thesis I am also grateful to the faculty and staff of Ho Chi Minh University of Law for the wonderful academic environment they have been provided during the last four years of my undergraduate study I would also like to thank my friends and classmates who always support me Last but not least, I would like to thank my beloved family for their unconditional love and sacrifices throughout the years ABBREVIATION LIST AANZFTA Agreement Establishing the ASEAN-Australia-New Zealand Free Trade Area AB Appellate Body AD Anti-dumping measure AKFTA Agreement Establishing the Vietnam-Korea Free Trade Area AKTIGA ASEAN-Korea Agreement on Trade in Goods ASG Agreement on Safeguards BSG Bilateral safeguard measure CRTA Committee on Regional Trade Agreements CU Customs union DSB Dispute Settlement Body DSU Understanding on Rules and Procedures Governing the Settlement of Disputes EVFTA European Union-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement FTA Free trade area GATT General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1994 GSG Global safeguard measure MERCOSUR Mercado Común del Sur METI Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry MFN Most-favoured-nation NAFTA North American Free Trade Area ORRCs Other restrictive regulations of commerce RTA Regional trade agreement SAT Substantially all the trade SG Safeguard measure TPP Trans-Pacific Partnership US United States USITC United States International Trade Commission VCA Vietnam Competition Authority WTO World Trade Organization TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION .3 CHAPTER LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR SAFEGUARD MEASURES IN REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS .8 1.1 WTO rules for safeguard measures and regional trade agreements 1.1.1 WTO rules for safeguard measures 1.1.2 WTO rules on regional trade agreements 12 1.2 Legal status of safeguard measures in regional trade agreements 17 1.2.1 WTO review of regional trade agreements .17 1.2.2 Permission versus elimination of safeguard measures in RTAs under GATT Article XXIV:8 20 Conclusions 27 CHAPTER LEGAL ISSUES OF SAFEGUARD MEASURES IN REGIONAL TRADE AGREEMENTS 28 2.1 Safeguard measures excluding regional imports 28 2.1.1 Parallelism requirement 28 2.1.2 Non-attribution requirement .31 2.1.3 Proportionality requirement .33 2.1.4 Article XXIV as justification .35 2.2 Safeguard measures applying to regional imports 40 2.2.1 RTA tariff concessions as unforeseen developments 41 2.2.2 GATT obligations incurred and regional imports 43 2.3 Safeguard measures in Vietnam’s RTAs and recommendations 49 2.3.1 Safeguard provisions in Vietnam‟s RTAs 49 2.3.2 Recommendations .52 Conclusions 56 CONCLUSIONS .57 BIBLIOGRAPHY i INTRODUCTION Necessity of the study In Vietnam, safeguard measures (SGs) have been widely considered as a useful means of protection for domestic firms by both the academia and the public There is evidence that Vietnamese firms have tended to be more active in utilising SGs to protect themselves from foreign competition There have also been many discussions in the country on how to improve domestic firms‟ capacity to take SG actions, particularly when Vietnam has committed to deep tariff concessions in several regional trade agreements (RTAs) (all of them belongs to the category of free trade areas) The conclusion of RTAs with deep and extensive tariff concessions has exposed Vietnamese businesses to economic shocks from import surges Thus, the need of firms for SGs to remedy or prevent injury from RTA imports is understandably growing; yet little is discussed in the Vietnamese legal literature with respect to SGs in the context of regional trade SGs and RTAs are undoubtedly complicated topics On the one hand, SGs are an exception to the World Trade Organization‟s (WTO) market access principle and, unlike anti-dumping and countervailing measures, SGs are required to be nondiscriminatory On the other hand, RTAs share the same trade liberalisation objective with the WTO, yet are a direct exception to the principle of MostFavoured-Nation (MFN) When these two contrasting legal exceptions come into interaction, conflicts unsurprisingly arise There has been a controversy over the relationship between Article XIX of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade of 1994 (GATT) together with the Agreement on Safeguards (ASG) and Article XXIV of the GATT The first two require SGs to be non-discriminatory in principle, while the third allows RTAs to discriminatorily eliminate trade barriers (presumably including SGs) between participants In practice, there are several RTAs prohibiting the application of SGs in their internal trade and/or requiring the exclusion of RTA parties from the scope of WTO SGs once these measures are applied Such RTAs are incompatible with the non-discrimination principle of SGs under GATT Article XIX and the ASG, yet whether Article XXIV can be a defence for such violations is unclear Besides, as the WTO safeguard mechanism was designed to remedy injurious imports resulting from GATT obligations, there may be legal conflicts between multilateral and regional rules when these measures are applied to imports from RTAs The complex legal reality entails the risk of WTO inconsistencies and disputes, and may also cause difficulties and confusions for the party applying SGs, especially developing countries lacking resources and experience such as Vietnam Such a background prompts the need to examine more closely the relevant multilateral and regional trade rules Therefore, this thesis provides an attempt to examine the issues identified in the literature as well as other potential legal uncertainties to give preliminary recommendations for the problems Literature review In Vietnam, there are many works on SGs and RTAs However, few address the interplay between these two legal institutions In the international literature, both SGs and RTAs have also attracted extensive research Notable works concerning SGs in RTAs include: - Pauwelyn, Joost (2004), “The Puzzle of WTO Safeguards and Regional Trade Agreements”, Journal of International Economic Law, 7(1), pp 109-142 This paper is probably one the most insightful works on the topic Pauwelyn comprehensively examines the legal issues surrounding the application of SGs in the regional trade context He concludes that, among other things: (i) GATT Article XIX requires WTO Members to exlude imports from RTA parties from the scope of investigation; (ii) Once RTA imports are excluded, their injurious effect shall not be attributed to non-RTA imports; (iii) WTO SGs shall be applied to imports from all sources but only to the extent necessary to offset injury from non-RTA imports; (iv) The Appellate Body‟s “parallelism” requirement may lead to absurd legal consequences and complicates the problem more than resolves it; (v) GATT Article 49 2.3 Safeguard measures in Vietnam’s RTAs and recommendations So far Vietnam has participated in several RTAs which retain members‟ right to apply SGs in regional as well as multilateral trade There are two main safeguard mechanisms in RTAs: (i) “global” safeguard measures (GSGs), i.e WTO or multilateral safeguard measures; and (ii) “regional”, “bilateral” or “transitional” safeguard measures (BSGs), which are included to remedy or prevent injurious imports from regional tariff concessions GSG provisions vary from containing mere retainments of WTO rights and obligations to imposing more stringent legal requirements BSG provisions, typically applied in regional trade context, consequently impose special and different obligations from the pre-existing WTO requirements Referenced RTAs in this section consist of: (i) the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), (ii) ASEAN-Korea Agreement on Trade in Goods (AKTIGA), (iii) Agreement Establishing the ASEAN-Australia-New Zealand FTA (AANZFTA), (iv) Vietnam-Korea Free Trade Agreement (VKFTA), and the (v) European Union-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) These are some of Vietnam‟s FTAs that were notified to the WTO under GATT Article XXIV 2.3.1 Safeguard provisions in Vietnam’s RTAs - Global safeguard measures With regards to GSGs, all referenced Vietnam‟s RTAs retain parties‟ rights and obligations to apply SGs under WTO law For instance, Article of the ASEAN-Korea Agreement on Trade in Goods (AKTIGA) provides that: “Each Party which is a WTO member retains its rights and obligations under Article XIX of GATT 1994 and the WTO Agreement on Safeguards.” Similarly, Article 6.2(1) of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) also retains parties‟ right to invoke global safeguard measures when it states that: “Nothing in this Agreement [i.e the TPP] affects the rights and obligations of the Parties under Article XIX of GATT 1994 and the Safeguards Agreement.” In other words, all WTO SG rules as set out in Article XIX of the GATT and the ASG must be complied with by RTA members when they take a GSG action The identical language can also be found in Article 50 7.5 of the Vietnam-Korea Free Trade Agreement (VKFTA) and many other FTAs that Vietnam has participated.172 Some RTAs allow parties to exclude RTA imports from the scope of GSGs Article 7.5 of the VKFTA allows parties taking a GSG to exclude imports of an originating good of the other Party as long as such imports are not a substantial cause of serious injury or threat thereof.173 The TPP also provides in Article 6.2(4) an additional right for a GSG imposing party to exclude from the scope of the measures (i) the imports under a tariff rate quota (TRQ) established by that party under the TPP and (ii) imports set out in that party‟s TPP trade commitments; provided that such imports are not a cause of serious injury or threat thereof to the domestic industry of like or directly competitive products.174 Such provision is not contained in other Vietnam‟s FTA It should be noted that, VKFTA Article 7.5 and TPP Article 6.2(4) not allow parties to totally ignore imports from RTA partners in the investigation process, rather requires parties to determine the causal link between increased imports and serious injury or threat thereof before excluding those parties from the scope of SGs Many RTAs prohibit parties to apply GSGs, BSGs, and special SGs on the same good at the same time For example, the TPP prohibits parties to impose more than one measure on the same good at the same time, whether it be a GSG, a BSG, or another special SG set out in the TPP Agreement.175 This provision implies that parties intending to apply another measure on the same good must first terminate the prior measure Similar language is also contained in the VKFTA176, AKTIGA,177 AANZFTA,178 and the EVFTA.179 - 172 Bilateral safeguard measures See, for example, Article of the AANZFTA Article 7.5(1) of the VKFTA 174 Article 6.2(4) of the TPP 175 Article 6.2(5) of the TPP 176 Article 7.5(3) of the VKFTA 177 Article 9.10 of the AKTIGA 178 Article 9.2 of the AANZFTA 179 Article 1, Section XX of the EVFTA 173 51 Although there are many variations of BSG provisions, the conditions for invocation of such measures are generally laid down as: “[I]f, as a result of the reduction or elimination of a customs duty under this Agreement, an originating good of the other Party is being imported into the territory of a Party in such increased quantities, in absolute terms or relative to domestic production, and under such conditions that the imports of such originating good from the other Party constitute a substantial cause of serious injury, or threat thereof, to a domestic industry producing a like or directly competitive good [ ].”180 Generally, RTAs sets out three conditions for the application of a BSG: (i) increases in imports; (ii) serious injury or threat thereof to domestic producers of like or directly competitive goods; and (iii) causation between increased imports and injury Such requirements are equivalent to requirements for the invocation of GSGs as set out in Article 2.1 of the ASG.181 Normally, neither tariff rate quotas nor quantitative restrictions would be a permissible form of BSGs.182 In most RTAs, BSGs can only be in two forms: (a) suspensions of the further reduction of customs duty; or (b) increases in the rate of customs duty on the good to a level not to exceed the lesser of: (i) the mostfavoured-nation (MFN) applied rate of customs duty in effect at the time the measure is applied; and (ii) the MFN applied rate of customs duty in effect on the day immediately preceding the date of entry into force of this Agreement for that Party183 (or in some cases, a fixed base rate set out by the RTA).184 Similar to the ASG, RTAs usually sets out the principle of proportionality for the application of BSGs: BSGs must only be maintained to the extent and period 180 This language can be found with minor variations in Article 1.1, Section XY of the EVFTA, Article 7.1 of the VKFTA, Article of the AANZFTA 181 Article 2.1 of the ASG 182 Article 7.1 of the VKFTA 183 Article of the AANZFTA Article 7.1 of the VKFTA Article 6.3(2) of the TPP 184 Article 6.5 of the AANZFTA 52 necessary to prevent or remedy serious injury and to facilitate adjustment 185 RTAs normally impose a time restriction on BSGs, ranging from one to three years In any case, no party shall maintain a transitional safeguard measure beyond the expiration of the transition period.186 In other cases, BSG application period shall not exceed two years, with an extension of one year if the imposing party demonstrates that the BSG continues to be necessary to prevent or remedy serious injury and to facilitate adjustment.187 With regards to the facilitation of adjustment requirement, the examined RTAs not require an adjusment plan for the domestic industry However, in a situation where the expected duration of a BSG is over one year, the party that applies the measure shall progressively liberalise it at regular intervals during the period of application.188 2.3.2 Recommendations - Regarding SGs excluding RTA imports As above the discussion points out, the consistency of the GSGs excluding RTA imports is not clear under WTO law The practice is contrary to the nondiscrimination of GSGs according to Article 2.2 of the ASG According to WTO case law, the exclusions of RTA imports from the scope of a GSG have been faulted because the competent authorities failed to comply with the (i) parallelism and (ii) non-attribution requirements Besides, the principle of proportionality, though not challenged before the WTO yet, shall also be adhered to By relying on parallelism and non-attribution, the Panels and the AB have been able to prevent Argentina and the U.S from applying discriminatory SGs However, the AB has not solved the core problem In their Report, the AB held: “[…] we wish to underscore that, as the issue is not raised in this appeal, we make no ruling on whether, as a general principle, a member of a customs union can exclude other members of that customs union from the application of a safeguard 185 Article 6.3(2) and Article 6.4(1) of the TPP Article 6.1(a) of the AANZFTA Article 6.4(3) of the TPP 186 Article 6.4(3) of the TPP; Article 1.1., Section XY of the EVFTA Article 2.5(b), Section XY of the EVFTA 188 Article 2.6, Section XY of the EVFTA 187 53 measure.”189 Thus, even when the competent authority‟s GSG application successfully passes the two requirements, it is not clear whether such a violation of Article 2.2 is justified by GATT Article XXIV Therefore, the legality of discriminatory application of GSG are uncertain and may still be challenged in the WTO Countries usually excluding RTA imports, such as the US, are not likely to challenge the issue if the expected outcome is adverse to them In contrast, adversely affected countries from such practice are motivated to bring the case to the WTO, either as claimants or third parties As the two recent RTA that Vietnam has participated in, the TPP and the VKFTA, allow parties to exclude RTA imports from the scope of GSGs if these imports are not a substantial cause of injury It is necessary for Vietnam to carefully consider the case before applying the excluding provisions It may be more beneficial for Vietnam to exclude RTA imports from the GSGs in order not to interfere with regional trade liberalisation, however, the legal consequences are unclear and the practice may result in costly trade disputes Besides, there is also some relevant uncertainties in the text of some RTAs In prohibiting simultaneous SGs, RTAs usually contain the following language: “No Party shall apply or maintain two or more of the following measures, with respect to the same good, at the same time: (a) a transitional safeguard measure under this Chapter; (b) a safeguard measure under Article XIX of GATT 1994 and the Safeguards Agreement; [ ].”190 The provision is drafted to avoid the overlap between WTO SGs (or GSGs) and BSGs However, due to the vague term “with respect to the same good”, it is not clear whether, in situations where RTA imports are excluded from a GSG, the provision prohibits the importing country to apply a new BSG to the excluded RTA 189 190 Ibid, para 114 Article 6.2(5) of the TPP Article 7.5(3) of the VKFTA 54 imports causing serious injury to the domestic industry There may be two contrasting views: (i) The phrase “the same good” means “the same products that are within the scope of another SG” In this view, the importing country is allowed to apply BSG to RTA imports; (ii) “The same good” means “the same type of products”; thus, the importing country is not allowed to apply BSG to RTA imports of the same type with non-RTA imports already affected by a GSG Given that, in such situation, there are both injurious imports from either RTA or non-RTA countries, and there is no overlapping between GSG and BSG, it is advisable that the first interpretation is adopted However, if the second interpretation is adopted, the importing country will lose the right to apply BSG on the RTA imports if it excludes these imports from the scope of a currently in force GSG In such a case, Vietnam can either take a “secured” position and does not apply the exclusion right under the TPP and VKFTA until the uncertainties are resolved Nevertheless, as the law is uncertain, Vietnam can still exclude RTA imports originating from within the RTA (the TPP or the VKFTA) if these imports are not a substantial cause of injury and “await” legal challenges As pointed out by Ahn,191 the current WTO dispute settlement system is unfortunately ineffective with respect to SG disputes Based on statistics from 2005, WTO dispute settlement proceedings take 545 days on average to complete, rendering even unjustified SGs to be in force for a long period of time.192 Cases such as Argentina – Footwear & US – Wheat Gluten had the due dates for the implementation periods coincided with the expiration dates for the original SGs.193 More recently, in Dominican Republic – Bags and Fabric, although the Dominican Republic‟s SGs were sucessfully challenged, the measures expired at approximately the same time with the implementation of dispute settlement, thus the dispute settlement had no economic 191 Ahn, Dukgeun, “Restructuring the WTO Safeguard System” in Matsushita, Mitsuo & Ahn, Dukgeun & Chen, Tain-Jy (eds) (2006), The WTO Trade Remedy System - East Asian Perspective, Cameron May Publishers, pp 12-15 192 Ibid 193 Ibid 55 effects.194 Given that scenario, Vietnam can still apply selective SGs to protect its trade with RTA parties and hopefully, a challenge of the measures to the WTO will give a more definite answer to the excluding practice - Remarks & recommendations regarding imposition of GSG on RTA imports As discussed in section 2.3, RTA tariff concessions are not likely to be accepted as “unforeseen developments”, which is a difficult element to prove in cases related to SGs Meanwhile, the “GATT obligations incurred” requirement contained in the first clause of GATT Article XIX, has been clarified in some Panel‟s Reports to be an important prerequisite for SG application, and the “GATT obligations incurred” must, in fact, lead to increased imports However, a brief look at some Vietnam‟s recent SG application public reports shows that the competent authority (Vietnam Competition Authority – VCA) has paid little or no attention to these requirements Nevertheless, in VCA‟s Final Report on the safeguard investigation regarding imported oils, the VCA considered tariff concessions under the ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement (ATIGA) partly established unforeseen developments, because the tariff concessions facilitated increases in imports, which went beyond the expectations of the domestic industries.195 This finding contains at least two flaws: (i) The competent authority must demostrate that unforeseen developments must be unforeseen by WTO Member, not by domestic industries; (ii) ATIGA tariff concessions, which led to increases in oil imports are unlikely to satisfy the “unforeseen developments” requirement Therefore, there is probably a lack of legal grounds to invoke a WTO SG in this case In the context of RTA proliferation, some Members seem to have paid more attention to the phrase “GATT obligations incurred” and have sucessfully 194 Bown & Wu (2014), Supra note 150, p 222 Vietnam Competition Authority, Final Report, Investigation of the Application of Safeguard Measures on Imported Refined Oils, 12-KN-TVE-01, adopted August 23rd, 2013, p 19 http://chongbanphagia.vn/Modules/News/Uploaded/38/2016062209251651bao-cao-cuoi-cung-publicfinal0.pdf (last accessed: 15 July 2016) 195 56 challenged violations of this requirement, reflected in Dominican Republic – Bags & Fabric and Ukraine – Cars Therefore, Vietnam‟s competent authority should give more considerations to the requirement and draw a clear line between GSG and BSG mechanisms in order to act consistently with WTO rules The first mechanism is operated to prevent or remedy injurious imports as results of GATT obligations incurred, while the latter is applied on RTA imports, which are the results of RTA tariff concessions Since RTA tariff concessions may replace GATT obligations as a prerequisite for GSG application, the more tariff concessions a WTO Member makes under RTAs, the fewer triggers are available for the Member to invoke GSGs When RTA imports cause injury to its domestic industry, the Member has to rely on BSGs, of which availability eventually expires after the transitional period of the RTA Conclusions The Chapter above has examined two main issues regarding the application SGs in RTAs: SGs excluding RTA imports and SGs applying to RTAs imports The first issue has been brought to the WTO in several cases, however, the key question of whether GATT Article XXIV can justify SGs excluding RTA imports has not been resolved To exclude RTA imports from the scope of SGs, the importing country must adhere to the “parallelism”, “non-attribution” and “proportionality” requirements, among other things Yet the WTO-consistency of such a practice is still not clear Since the TPP and VKFTA allow parties to exclude RTA members from SGs, Vietnam can either choose not to apply the right in practice, or exclude its RTA parties to protect regional trade The latter issue has not been paid as much as attention to but has been reflected in some recent cases To apply SGs to RTA imports, it is difficult for the importing country to demonstrate the “unforeseen developments” and “GATT obligations incurred” requirements The most appropriate option to remedy RTA imports is probably BSGs 57 CONCLUSIONS SGs are needed in trade agreements as flexibility for parties to deviate from their obligations in critical circumstances When SGs and RTAs come into interaction, legal uncertainties arise On the one hand, RTAs encourage some WTO Members to reduce or eliminate SGs in their internal trade On the other hand, due to the proliferation of RTAs which usually accompany deep tariff reductions, the need for SG imposition increases, especially to remedy injury from RTA import surges This reality together with the uncertain legality of SGs in RTAs has provoked many legal issues The thesis has provided some suggestions for the problems Firstly, it has examined GATT Article XXIV:8 and concluded that SGs may be retained in intra-RTA trade as long as duties and other restrictive regulations of commerce are eliminated with respect to substantially all the regional trade This is also the main approaches taken by many WTO Members in their RTAs Secondly, the thesis has examined the practice of excluding RTA imports from WTO SGs which has been successfully challenged in the WTO The Appellate Body has not ruled directly on the relationship between Article XIXV and Article XIX, which is the core issue of the practice, instead it imposed on Members the “parallelism” requirement and rendered the legality of the practice unknown in the near future Thirdly, the application of SGs to RTA imports also entails some uncertainties As RTA imports are not results of GATT obligations that Members incurred, such imports shall not be subject to SG investigation under the WTO The lawful way to remedy injurious imports from RTA should usually be BSGs Facing such complicated and uncertain rules, Vietnam should take a cautious position in order not to get caught in unnecessary and costly disputes i BIBLIOGRAPHY A TREATIES Agreement Establishing the Customs Union between the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic Agreement on Safeguards ASEAN-Korea Agreement on Trade in Goods European-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1994 Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization North American Free Trade Agreement Trans-Pacific Partnership Understanding on Rules And Procedures Governing the Settlement Of Disputes 10 Understanding on the Interpretation of Article XXIV of the GATT 1994 11 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 12 Vietnam-Korea Free Trade Agreement B WTO CASES 13 Appellate Body Report, Argentina – Safeguard Measures on Imports of Footwear, WT/DS121/AB/R, adopted 12 January 2000 14 Appellate Body Report, Korea – Definitive Safeguard Measure on Imports of Certain Dairy Products, WT/DS98/AB/R, adopted 12 January 2000 15 Appellate Body Report, Turkey – Restrictions on Imports of Textile and Clothing Products, WT/DS34/AB/R, adopted 19 November 1999 16 Appellate Body Report, United States – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Imports of Wheat Gluten from the European Communities, WT/DS166/AB/R, adopted 19 January 2001 ii 17 Appellate Body Report, United States – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Imports of Circular Welded Carbon Quality Line Pipe from Korea, WT/DS202/AB/R, adopted March 2002 18 Appellate Body Report, United States – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Imports of Certain Steel Products, WT/DS248/AB/R, WT/DS249/AB/R, WT/DS251/AB/R, WT/DS252/AB/R, WT/DS253/AB/R, WT/DS254/AB/R, WT/DS258/AB/R, WT/DS259/AB/R, adopted 10 December 2003 19 Appellate Body Report, United States – Safeguard Measures on Imports of Fresh, Chilled or Frozen Lamb Meat from New Zealand and Australia, WT/DS177/AB/R, WT/DS178/AB/R, adopted 16 May 2001 20 GATT Working Party Report, Working Party on the Customs Union between the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic, L/7501, adopted October 1994 21 Panel Report, Dominican Republic – Safeguard Measures on Imports of Polypropylene Bags and Tubular Fabric, WT/DS415/R, WT/DS416/R, WT/DS417/R, WT/DS418/R, and Add.1, adopted 22 February 2012 22 Panel Report, Turkey – Restrictions on Imports of Textile and Clothing Products, WT/DS34/R, adopted 19 November 1999 23 Panel Report, Ukraine – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Certain Passenger Cars, WT/DS468/R and Add.1, adopted 20 July 2015 24 Panel Report, United States – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Imports of Circular Welded Carbon Quality Line Pipe from Korea, WT/DS202/R, adopted March 2002 25 Panel Report, United States – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Imports of Wheat Gluten from the European Communities, WT/DS166/R, adopted 19 January 2001 26 Panel Reports, United States – Definitive Safeguard Measures on Imports of Certain Steel Products, WT/DS248/R and Corr.1 / WT/DS249/R and iii Corr.1 / WT/DS251/R and Corr.1 / WT/DS252/R and Corr.1 / WT/DS253/R and Corr.1 / WT/DS254/R and Corr.1 / WT/DS258/R and Corr.1 / WT/DS259/R and Corr.1, adopted 10 December 2003 C OTHER OFFICIAL MATERIALS 27 Vietnam Competition Authority Final Report, Investigation of the Application of Safeguard Measures on Imported Refined Oils, 12-KNTVE-01, adopted 23 August 2013 28 WTO Secretariat (1997), Annotated Checklist of Systemic Issues, WT/REG/W/16 29 WTO Secretariat (2000), Synopsis of “Systemic” Issues Related to Regional Trade Agreements, WT/REG/W/37 30 WTO Secretariat (2002), Compendium of Issues Related to Regional Trade Agreements, WTO Doc TN/RL/W/8/Rev.1 31 WTO Secretariat (2009), World Trade Report 2009 – Trade Policy Commitments and Contingency Measures, World Trade Organization D BOOKS & BOOK CHAPTERS 32 Ahn, Dukgeun, “Restructuring the WTO Safeguard System” in Matsushita, Mitsuo & Ahn, Dukgeun & Chen, Tain-Jy (eds) (2006), The WTO Trade Remedy System – East Asian Perspective, Cameron May Publishers, pp 11-31 33 Lee, Yong-Shik (2014), Safeguard Measures in World Trade – The Legal Analysis (3rd ed.), Edward Elgar 34 Mavroidis, Petros C et al (2008), The Law and Economics of Contingent Protection in the WTO, Edward Elgar 35 Mitchell, Andrew D & Lockhart, Nicolas J.S (2009), “Legal Requirements for PTAs under the WTO” in Lester, Simon & Mercurio, Bryan (eds) (2009), Bilateral and Regional Trade Agreements – Commentary and Analysis, Vol 2, Cambridge University Press, pp 81113 iv 36 Teh, Robert & Prusa, Thomas J & Budetta, Michele, “Contingent Protection Rules in Regional Trade Agreements” in Bagwell, Kyle W & Mavroidis, Petros C (eds) (2011), Preferential Trade Agreements – A Law and Economics Analysis, Cambridge University Press, pp 60-114 37 Trebilcock, Michael J & Howse, Robert (2005), The Regulation of International Trade Law (3rd ed.), Routledge 38 Van den Bossche, Peter (2005), The Law and Policy of the World Trade Organization – Text, Cases and Materials, Cambridge University Press 39 World Trade Organization (2007), WTO Analytical Index – Guide to WTO Law and Practice (2nd ed.), Cambridge University Press E JOURNAL ARTICLES 40 Ahn, Dukgeun (2008), “Foe or Friend of GATT Article XXIV – Diversity in Trade Remedy Rules”, Journal of International Economic Law, 11(1), pp 120-121 41 Bown, Chad P., & Wu, Mark (2014), 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