 RESTRICTED  
  
JOB/ACC/ TLS/8 
5 October  2022 
(22-7523) Page: 1/7 
Working Party on the Accession of Timor -Leste  Original: English  
 
ACCESSION OF TIMOR -LESTE  
OPENING S TATEMENT B Y H.E. MR JOAQUIM AMARAL,  
COORDINATING MINISTER OF ECONOMIC AFFAIRS AND CHIEF NEGOTIATOR  ON WTO ACCESSION 
OF TIMOR -LESTE  
4th meeting of the Working Party on the Accession of Timor -Leste  
Friday, 30 September  2022, 10:00  am 
1. First of all, let me thank the Working Party for the warm reception of my delegation in Geneva. 
I would like to thank H.E. the Chair, Members of the Working Party and the WTO Secretariat for your 
sustained de dication and support to this process which allowed us to maintain the "momentum" on 
the road to Timor -Leste's accession , which we hope is now within reach.  
2. As you all know, while Timor -Leste had started its accession to the WTO almost six years ago, 
in Dec ember 2016 , the Working Party process activated in October 2020. We have worked 
expeditiously ever since, engaging with Members bilaterally and multilaterally, supported and guided 
by their requests. We are very pleased to be again in this room, for this 4th meeting of the Working 
Party that is taking place only two years since it met for the first time. I trust that the pace and 
substance of this process, which has now further advanced driven by our commitment, is 
corroborating our strong determination to join the WTO family as early as possible.  
3. As you all know, accession to the WTO is a matter of a national strategic priority for 
Timor -Leste, together with integration to ASEAN. As stated by our President, H.E. Jose Ramos -Horta, 
"it is obvious that in this increasingly complex world of interconnectedness and interdependency, of 
challenges, risks and of opportunities, multilateralism, regional integration and cooperation and a 
rules-based World Order are sine qua non  conditions for peace, security and prosperity for all." As  a 
young state, Timor -Leste cannot remain outside of the global and regional trade institutions and 
needs to become part and add its voice as early as possible. We believe in the potential of trade as 
a driving force to promote economic growth and development, raise standards of living and to further 
the goal of stability, peace and good governance.  
4. Dear Chair, o nce again,  it was a great pleasure to host you and the Secretariat in Dili in July. 
It was a critical visit in terms of evaluating first -hand our domestic preparation and strong 
commitment across all involved domestic stakeholders: including all levels of the State, political 
parties, private sector and civil society.  
5. I am confident that the mission realized how importan t the accession to WTO is for 
Timor -Leste. As part of that timely visit, we were particularly pleased to host you for the High -Level 
Conference on WT O/ASEAN Accessions. In the conference, with the participation of President Jose 
Ramos -Horta, Prime Minister Taur Matan Ruak, and other high -level participants, we explored 
synergies and complementarities between the two processes, where one cannot advance without 
the other. We were also pleased that your visit concurred with the ASEAN Economic Pillar 
Fact-Finding Mission and that you ha d the opportunity of contributing to this parallel accession effort.  
6. Since our previous Working Party meeting in April, we have been working hard to further 
advance both on the bilateral, multilateral and legislative tracks of our accession.   JOB/ACC/TLS/8  
 
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  7. As announced to Members at the Third meeting, in the beginning of June we circulated our 
revised market access o ffers on goods and services. We aim these revised offers to be our last  ones. 
The average bound tariff rate in our goods offer now is 11.4%. This is the lowest average bound 
rate among LDC Members, and only 27 WTO Members – non-LDCs – have lower average bound 
rates.  
8. In the services offer, we have committed in a substantial number of services 
sectors/subsectors (11 sectors and 86 subsectors as compared to 32 subsectors in our initial offer), 
in response to market access requests made by Members. We have also clarified and elaborat ed on 
our horizontal commitments, and now compare well with other acceded LDCs in terms of overall 
level of commitments. In response to Members' requests, we have  also revised our 
Most-Favored -Nation 's exemption list as well as  committed to some sectors th at are yet to be 
regulated in the country, while looking to find the right balance between opening our services market 
and protecting our national interests.  
9. I am pleased to report to you the substantial progress achieved in our bilateral market access 
negotiations with Members. On 15 July, we signed bilateral market access agreements with Australia 
and New Zealand. This week, we concluded bilateral market access negotiations with Canada and 
the Philippines, and we expect to sign the agreements in  the coming weeks. Bilateral market access 
negotiations with Japan are close to conclusion and I dare to say that we are also close to finish ing 
negotiations with the European Union. We have also advanced in our negotiations with the United 
States and, aft er our last meeting yesterday, we hope that our hard work would be fruitful. We have 
had very productive conversations with Cambodia , and we will resume negotiations with Indonesia 
on 7 October. Building on this progress, it is our intention to continue en gaging actively with 
Members, aiming to advance and conclude the remaining negotiations before the end of the year.  
10. We once again thank all Members for their constructive and substantive involvement, despite 
a busy period of the WTO Public Forum. Moving f orward, I continue to ask for Members' support to 
maintain an active and productive dialogue with us at this critical phase of our accession, as we 
remain available to meet with you in any format and at any time following this meeting.  
11. On the multilateral front, we provided responses to Members' questions and other requested 
documentation for the Working Party. We have also provided our inputs for the Draft Report of the 
Working Party, prepared by the Secretariat, to realize this important meeting.  I am ple ased to update 
the Working Party that, in addition to 25 draft commitments proposed for consideration at the last 
Working Party meeting, we have agreed to undertake three more commitments in the Draft Report: 
on Trading Rights, Customs Valuation and Servic es Domestic Regulation.  
12. The latter milestone commitment reflects the Government's decision to join the Initiative on 
Services Domestic Regulation upon accession, as the first LDC and the first acceding government, 
which we announced on the margins of the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference in June. This important 
decision was made with the aim to further and consolidate reform towards services regulatory 
practice as well as to signal that we are ready to fully engage in the multilateral trading system.  
13. In thi s regard, I should also highlight that we very much appreciated the concrete outcomes 
of MC12 responding to the challenges which are very relevant for us. We follow all discussions 
closely, especially on Fisheries Subsidies, Response to the Pandemic and Fo od Security, and are 
ready to join and contribute when we can.  
14. In addition , I am glad to announce that our Council of Ministers, just last week, decided that 
Timor -Leste will join the Information Technology Agreement (ITA) and the ITA Expansion Agreement 
(ITA-II), which will eliminate its tariffs on a number of IT products classified under the Agreements.   JOB/ACC/TLS/8  
 
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  15. My report would be incomplete without an update on where we are on the legislative front. 
This is now a priority pillar of our work. Since the last Work ing Party meeting, we have intensified 
our domestic engagement on the development and enactment of the necessary legislation, aiming 
to have a clear calendar of legislative steps for 2022 -2023, covering legislation for adoption in the 
accession and post -accession periods, in the areas of: investment, trade facilitation, customs, 
licensing, fiscal reform and taxation, rules of origin, SPS, export promotion, industrial policy, 
intellectual property and services. Many of these draft decree -laws are now in  the pipeline for 
consideration and approval by the Council of Ministers, as per the calendar of its meetings, before 
the end of the year.  
16. While we will provide a detailed report under agenda item (III) of this meeting, I am 
particularly pleased to mention tha t we have provided 24 more pieces of legislation for review by 
the Working Party since the last meeting. This includes 13 draft pieces of legislation, including some 
specifically requested by Members – e.g., the draft Decree -Law on Customs Valuation which we 
submitted yesterday. Given the numerous developments on this active work pillar since the 
circulation of the revised Legislative Action Plan in July, we have asked the Secretariat to circulate 
updated information on legislation as a room document for th is meeting. which I will present under 
the respective agenda item.  
17. I would also like to extend special thanks to Members who support us on this legislative work 
– we are very grateful and counting on continuing to be assisted by you on this path to WTO 
compliance.  
18. I would like to conclude by stressing that we are doing our part with great dedication, 
committing to this process strategically, beyond what is expected from an LDC. Thus, we continue 
to appreciate Members' consideration of our specific needs i n this process as well as specific 
transition periods for the implementation of some of the future commitments, when and as 
necessary.  
19. Overall, we hope that our ambitious "commitment package" confirms our dedication to 
adhering to the WTO rules while refle cting our strong will to integrate into the multilateral trading 
system. On behalf of my Government, I highly value the cooperation that we have, and I look 
forward to continuing our discussion with Members.  
20. At the same time, we are fully conscious that ge tting closer to the final accession run is not 
exempt of challenges. I am confident that the bilateral meetings we have had with Members during 
these past days, as well as the discussions today, will be essential to tackle the concerns raised by 
Members, s uch as the advancement on the remaining legislation. We are eager to prove our 
readiness for WTO membership and, when necessary, to "think creatively" to work on eventual flows. 
With your support, we are fully determined to make all necessary efforts to fi nalize our accession 
process by early next year in accordance with our accession roadmap, whereby, we are committed 
to becoming a Member of the WTO in 2023.  
21. Today's meeting reflects the spirit of this year's Public Forum: Let's move from ambition to 
action.  
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  STATEMENT ON BILATERAL STATE OF PLAY BY H.E. MR JOAQUIM AMARAL,  
COORDINATING MINISTER OF ECONOMIC AFFAIRS AND CHIEF NEGOTIATOR ON WTO ACCESSION 
OF TIMOR -LESTE  
4th meeting of the Working Party on the Accession of Timor -Leste   
Friday, 30 September 2022, 10:00 am  
1. I’m pleased to update you on the significant developments we have made at the bilateral level 
since our last Working Party Meeting in April.  
2. In the past four months we have signed bilateral market access agreements  with Australia 
and New Zealand, concluding our bilateral market a ccess negotiations on goods and services.  
We have also finalized negotiations on goods and services with the Philippines and Canada and will 
sign the bilateral market access a greements  within the next weeks.  
3. I am glad to announce that, after holding  several bilateral meetings with Japan, we have also 
almost finalized our bilateral negotiations a nd we expect to sign the respective bilateral market 
access a greement  with Japan  in the next months. We have also maintained productive negotiations 
with the European Union, and we are proud to say that we have finalized substantive negotiations 
with minor  issues to be agreed upon. We aim to also finalize and sign a bilateral market access   
agreement  before the end of the year. We have been able to finalize or almost conclude negotiations 
with these partners based on their reasonable requests combined with our will to open our markets 
while considering our needs and circumstances. The conclusion of this negotiations also proves our 
commitment and eagerness to open our country to international trade.  
4. With this in mind, I would like to thank all interested Mem bers for their support and availability 
to discuss our offers. I would also like to ask them to actively engage in the negotiations in this final 
period of our accession process.  
5. We are actively working to be able to respond to the concerns of the United States, including 
our bilateral negotiations on goods and our services offer and the need to finaliz e essential pieces of 
legislation prior to our accession. I am confident that we will be able t o find satisfactory solutions 
for both parties if we continue working together as we have been doing until now.  
6. In this regard, I would  also like to thank the Uni ted States, the European Union, Japan, the 
Philippines, and Canada for the productive bilateral meetings we have had on the margins of this 
Working Party meeting . As I said in my opening remarks, we have work ed hard to excel as an 
acceding country, and we are confident that our partners and WTO Members will take that into 
consideration within this process.   
7. We have been very active having bilateral and very productive negotiations with some of our 
neighbours including Cambodia. Negotiations with Indonesia will resume on 7 October. Indonesia is 
one of our key trade partners and our closest neighbour and we are conscious of the importance of 
reaching and sign ing the respective Bilateral Market Access Agreement .  
8. As we will examine later, we have responded to new rounds of questions from Members, and 
we have explained our answers to some of them bilaterally.  
9. To sum up, we have signed agreements and/or close d negotiations so far with Australia, New 
Zealand, Canada and the Philippines. We have almost concluded n egotiations with Japan and the 
European Union, and we have made remarkable progress with Cambodia. Finally, we are still 
negotiating with the United States and Indonesia. We have had contacts with other Members to 
bilaterally explain our answers to their q uestions.  
10. All in all, I think that the results are promising, and I look forward to continuing working hard 
to be able to finalize the bilateral negotiations with all remaining interested Members before the end 
of the year, considering the tentative roadmap for our accession .   
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  STATEMENT ON LEGISLATIVE DEVELOPMENTS B Y H.E. MR JOAQUIM AMARAL,  
COORDINATING MINISTER OF ECONOMIC AFFAIRS AND CHIEF NEGOTIATOR ON WTO ACCESSION 
OF TIMOR -LESTE  
4th meeting of the Working Party on the Accession of Timor -Leste   
Friday, 30 September 2022, 10:00 am  
1. We understand the importance of harmoni zing and updating our legislation to respond to WTO 
requirements. We are conscious that adapting our legal framework to align with international 
standards and the lates t trends is an opportunity for Timor -Leste. We are confident that our 
accession to the Organization will result in an updated and modern legal system which will enable 
us to be more attractive to foreign investors and will be essential for our private sect or to become 
global.  
2. In the last two years, we have been expeditiously updating our legal framework according to 
the needs of the accession process, trying to fill the gaps identified by our team, the WTO technical 
team and the Member States.  
3. We have tra nslated to English over 270 pieces of legislation which have been submitted to the 
Working Party members for consideration. In the last batches of documents, we have included some 
key legislation, including the Mining Code, the Proposal to the National Par liament for Legislative 
Authorization for the Insolvency Code and the Decree establishing the National Secretariat for the 
WTO. We have also submitted and circulated, even if not approved yet, the drafts of the Copyrights 
Law, Industrial Property Code, IP Office Decree -Law, the E -commerce Decree -Law and the first 
amendment to the Decree -law on Licencing of Economic activities, among others.  
4. Our last revision of the Legislative Action Plan was circulated in document 
WT/ACC/TLS/6/Rev.5 in end -July. I am plea sed to update you that, earlier this month, me and my 
team had a meeting with the Minister of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, and the 
Government has decided to prioritize the submission to the Council of Ministers of all WTO -related 
legislation  over until our accession is completed. Accordingly, we have requested to circulate the 
latest update on legislation as a room document RD/ACC/8  which is in front of you. The document 
provides a comprehensive update on the state of play and calendar for ad option of the WTO -related 
legislation during the accession and post -accession period, in 2022 -2023.  
5. Let me highlight several points:  
6. First of all, I would like to make a specific reference to the legislation related to the Customs 
Valuation Agreement. I am glad to inform you that, with the support of USAID, we have finished the 
draft of the Decree Law on Customs Valuation. Together with the draft Land Transport Law, the 
Decree Law on Customs Valuation has been circulated to the Working Party (notice of le gislation 
WT/ACC/TLS/25) and shared bilaterally with some members, including the United States, yesterday. 
This legislation will tackle the treatment of related parties and the evaluation of damaged goods. 
The Decree Law will also incorporate the interpret ative notes of the Agreement to our legal 
framework. It is our plan to adopt this legislation before November.  
7. Several other draft legislations have now also been finalised and are currently translated for 
submission to the Working Party after this meetin g and adoption by the Council of Ministers. These 
are: draft Decree Laws on Business Registration; Import Licensing; Commercial Licensing; Ship 
Inspection; and on Health, Safety and Hygiene at Work. We would like to thank the Australian 
Government for assi sting us on the development of several of these priority legislations, as well as 
on the drafts of the Export Promotion Law (submitted to the Working Party) and the Competition 
Law (draft to be ready in early 2023).   JOB/ACC/TLS/8  
 
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  8. Several other legislations are now also  in priority line for adoption and enactment before the 
end of 2022. These are the revised Decree Law on the Licensing of Economic Activities (approved 
by Council of Ministers on 21 September); Decree -laws on Rules of Origin and on Animal and Plant 
Health (scheduled to be considered by the Council of Ministers next week); Insolvency Law; 
Structure of SERVE; Legal Regime for Administrative Offences, Decree Establishing the Permanent 
Secretariat on WTO Accession; Decree Law on Industrial Licensing; Industrial  Policy; IP -related 
legislation; Land Transport Law and the Decree -Law on E -Commerce. Many of these drafts have 
been shared with the Working Party already, while others will also be shared on a priority basis, 
before adoption.  
9. Let me also highlight, once again, our strong commitment to transparency in this process, in 
line with the values of the WTO. I hope that the achieved legislative results and the numbers of 
legislation proactively shared with the Working Party, which represent a full inventory of our  
WTO-related legal framework, sufficiently demonstrates our commitment and readiness for 
accession. In this regard, I  would like to make clear that several of the draft legislations that we 
proactively report under the legislative action plan are for enact ment and implementation during the 
requested transition periods, or as part of the post -accession implementation plan, such as the 
legislation developed as part of the fiscal reform – draft VAT law, revisions to the Taxes and Duties 
Act and other legislati on scheduled for development in 2023. Unless Members advise otherwise, the 
adoption of this legislation is not seen as a pre -condition for WTO accession.  
10. At the same time, where possible, we are making an effort  to develop and adopt necessary 
WTO-consistent legislation even ahead of the requested transition periods, recognizing the necessity 
to have this legislation in place as early as possible. Thus, the draft Copyright Law, developed with 
the assistance of WIP O, is currently under consideration by the National Parliament. The draft IP 
Code is scheduled for submission to the Council of Ministers before the end of 2022.  
11. I hope that my intervention today reflects our commitment and will to fulfil all our obligati ons 
prior to joining the WTO. We are conscious that we still have hard work to do as we are advancing 
closer to the finali zation of the process, but I am confident that we will raise to the crucial task 
before us.  
12. To finalize, I would like to once again t hank all our Partners for their sound technical support 
in this process. As always, we welcome Members' comments and guidance on this process, and are 
happy to coordinate and respond to all requests, constructively and promptly.  
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  CLOSING  REMARKS AND NEXT STEPS B Y H.E. MR JOAQUIM AMARAL,  
COORDINATING MINISTER OF ECONOMIC AFFAIRS AND CHIEF NEGOTIATOR ON WTO ACCESSION 
OF TIMOR -LESTE  
4th meeting of the Working Party on the Accession of Timor -Leste   
Friday, 30 September 2022, 10:00 am  
1. As I said this morning, on behalf of the Government and the People of Timor -Leste, I thank 
you very much again for your commitment and support. I would like to ask you to please help us to 
maintain this “momentum” until we finalize the process and become me mber of the Organization.   
2. I would like to also thank the members of ASEAN and the fellow members of CPLP and g7+ 
for being here with us today and for their support to Timor -Leste’s accession to the WTO.  
3. Your questions, advice, and suggestions will be hi ghly considered for my team and me to 
further our work back home to fulfil the ambition of the accession roadmap.  
4. Joining the WTO and ASEAN are pillars of our domestic policy as per our Vision 2030. 
We consider that becoming an active player in the interna tional trade of goods and services is the 
bedrock of our economic expansion.  
5. We are willing to push for economic reforms, but sometimes we face an enormous challenge 
as a Least -developed  country. Therefore, we need to continue improving the technical capa cities of 
our human resources and upgrading our national infrastructure. This is necessary to attract foreign 
direct investment and diversify our economy beyond the petroleum and gas sector.  
6. Timor -Leste recognizes the critical role of technical assistance  and capacity building and the 
critical role of our development partners’ support.  
7. To finalize, I would also like to thank partners for their support and assistance, especially 
Australia, the United States, Portugal, New Zealand, Canada, the European Union , EIF, ITC, WIPO 
and the World Bank. I would like to reiterate again our gratitude to the WTO Secretariat for their 
relentless efforts  and commitment to our accession process.  
8. We look forward to continu ing actively working with you all after this Working Party meeting, 
to advance closer to our goal of WTO membership in 2023. You will hear from us very soon.  
 
 
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