As reported in a previous news item, L.M. Murray, the editor of the Canadian based website PokerPulse.com, launched a courageous and very praiseworthy initiative this week to garner diplomatic support from the Canadian government to help Antigua in it's free trade struggle against the US.
In a letter send on behalf of PokerPulse, Mr. Murray asked Canada's new Prime Minister for "a strong, renewed commitment by our envoys to show Canada’s support for Antigua".
Mr. Murray has been so kind to provide us with the full transcript of this letter, and has given us permission to reprint it here.
You are encouraged to approach your own trade envoys similarly to support Antigua in it's trade dispute with the US. By doing so you are also indirectly supporting the fight against prohibition of online poker in the US (more info in this article).
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From: legal
To: consultations@international.gc.ca
Cc: pm@pm.gc.ca ; out-info.por@international.gc.ca ; consultations@dfait-maeci.gc.ca
; legal@pokerpulse.com
Sent: Thursday, May 25, 2006 8:08 PM
Subject: Canada should grow some guts and support Antigua in
the Cross-Border Betting Dispute with the U.S.
Welcome PM Harper and Trade and Foreign Policy Ministers to the new
government,
I am delighted to see the wonderful changes you've made to the International
Trade Canada website, which is now informative and interactive - in
a word, useful. I hope these most welcome changes will be similarly
reflected in Canada's comportment at the World Trade Organization
(WTO). What I'm especially looking for is a strong, renewed commitment
by our envoys to show Canada's support for Antigua, the bravest and
boldest WTO Member, in its Cross-Border Betting Dispute with the U.S.
I have had the good fortune to meet Antigua's lead counsel, Mark Mendel,
who happily shares with me and probably many others, lucid translations
of the unique nomenclature and procedures involved in international
trade law, an area that is still not widely understood even by the
legal profession. With his help, I have been able, I hope, to clarify
the positions of both Antigua and the U.S. in the dispute and remove
at least some of the mystery of the WTO for our visitors. Imagine
my shame when I learned that Canada had abandoned Antigua mid-fight
with no explanation. Why, for goodness sake?
I met a number of representatives of Antigua at an international gaming
summit in Montreal last summer, and they were without exception earnest,
well spoken professionals. As residents of a tiny developing nation
with few resources, they were hard-pressed to find a way to self-sufficiency.
After much research and a lot of hard work, they were able to use
their knowledge of technology and the Internet to develop a legitimate,
well-regulated industry, an industry that became so successful, in
fact, that the U.S. is trying to shut it down. Even today, despite
two favorable panel decisions and a stated promise to comply, the
U.S. is considering two more pieces of legislation that would preclude
Antigua's participation in the U.S. market.
Nor can the U.S. make any credible moral claims as the basis for its
opposition. About five minutes after Antigua was forced to bring its
case to arbitration, the U.S. signed CAFTA, a trade agreement which
specifically allows signatories to provide gambling services within
the U.S. market.
Two words: softwood lumber. Who knows better than Canada what it's
like to 'negotiate' with our U.S. trading partners?
While Canadians may not be able to extricate ourselves from NAFTA,
let us at least bring our wisdom from that experience to bear on Antigua's
dispute.
I greatly fear that if Canada and other developed nations fail in
this opportunity to support a small, poor country that openly displays
its good report from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) at its
website for all the world to see, we will have failed in our primary
obligation, which should be to provide those benefits promised by
co-operation to all Members, especially those that are the most vulnerable.
Please re-evaluate the position of the old Pettigrew guard, whose
response to this opportunity was retreat! Retreat! Screw your courage,
Mr. Harper, Mr. Emerson, to the sticking place and help Antigua save
its fledgling industry, the very key to its independence and maybe
even the smallest taste of Western prosperity.
Thank you in advance for your kind attention,
L.M. Murray
Editor,
legal@pokerpulse.com
http://www.PokerPulse.com/legal
and The Roll & Shuffle,
http://www.pokerpulse.com/news/viewforum.php?f=12.
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