WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONWT/GC(99)/ST/6
5 August 1999
(99-3313)
Original:  English
STATEMENT BY THE HONOURABLE ROY MACLAREN
ON THE APPOINTMENT OF THE DIRECTOR-GENERAL
The following statement has been received from the Permanent Mission of Canada with the
request that it be circulated to Members.
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I welcome the formal announcement that Member Governments of the World Trade
Organization have now agreed on the next two Director s-General.  I wish them well in helping to pilot
the WTO through what will be a challenging stage in its furtherance of rules-based liberalized trade
and investment.
The two successive Directors-General will know that they have large footsteps to fill.  The
WTO's first Director-General, Renato Ruggiero, su ccessfully established the new Organization as a
central pillar not just of a more open world economy, but of a stable international order.  The
challenge will be to strengthen the international consensus that is so indispensable to its future
success.
We cannot fail to recognize that the selection of the two new Directors-General has been a
long and difficult process, which frequently placed an unnecessary strain on the system and its
membership, but should all learn from this experience.  With China, Russia and many other countrieswaiting to join, the WTO is poised to become truly global.  The challenge of leading a global system
of potentially 160 Members, with the vast bulk of its Members now from the developing world, is
very different from the task of managing a sm all GATT of mainly  industrialized countries.  In
acknowledging this reality, it is time to build an institution that is strong, decisive and representative,
as well as consensus-based.
Allow me to take this occasion to convey special message of thanks to the many Governments
that supported my candidature throughout the remarkab ly long selection process, and to urge that we
all now work together with the successive Directors-General to build a strong, vigorous and unified
World Trade Organization.
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