Bridgetown, Barbados - A new appeal has come from Sir Shridath Ramphal, the region's first chief negotiator of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM), for a delay in tomorrow's scheduled signing ceremony in Barbados of the full Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) with the European Union (EU).

RAMPHAL... now is not the time for final vows

Additionally, fresh warnings have been made by a leading Caribbean economist and advisor on international trade against negative implications for this region by the More Favoured Nation (MFN) clause in the controversial EPA.

All indications, however, point to the signing ceremony going ahead tomorrow at the Sherbourne Conference Centre for which ministers of the CARIFORUM group of countries (Caricom plus Dominican Republic) will start arriving today, as well as representatives of the European Commission and EU member states.

Yesterday, while Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer of Antigua and Barbuda (current chairman of Caricom) was hosting a one-day national consultation on benefits and challenges of the EPA in its initial form, Sir Shridath chose to make a strong plea from London for a delay in the signing ceremony.

The former chairman of The West Indian Commission and ex-Secretary General of the Commonwealth of nations, who is in England for activities marking his 80th birthday, noted in a brief statement that "In view of the state of global financial crisis and the threatened worldwide economic tsunami, all differences in our region apart, one has to question whether new reasons have not arisen for the Caribbean to defer consenting to be bound indefinitely by the CARIFORUM/EU EPA....".

The Agreement, he contends, was "made in Europe within the framework of a crumbling economic order and the assumptions it imposed. If concluded (with the signing), it will define future economic relations with Europe on the basis of an imprint that is changing in fundamental ways...".

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