U.S.: There Is Not Any Link Between Qualified Industrial Zones Project And Turkey's Policy During Iraq War

ANKARA - The United States said on Wednesday that there was not any link between the project of qualified industrial zones and the incidents that took place between Turkey and the United States during the Iraq war.
U.S. sources told A.A correspondent that the problem regarding the non-inclusion of the project in the near future agenda of the two wings of the U.S. Congress was tangled with whether or not the textile sector would be included in that project.
The same sources stated that Turkish side told the United States that ''the project was not attractive in case the textile sector was not included'' and the problem stemmed from that and it did not have any link with the policy that Turkey followed during the military operation against Iraq.
The qualified industrial zone project which came onto the agenda last year in order to increase trade between Turkey and the United States is not included in the near future projects of the two wings of the U.S. Congress.
A decision was taken on the project as an issue to be dwelled upon during the visit that former Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit paid to Washington in January 2002.
In order to overcome the efforts of the anti-Turkey lobbies in the U.S. congress to obstruct the project, these zones were foreseen to operate within the framework of the current free trade agreement between the United States and Israel and Israel was envisaged to join the project.
But later, there was a disagreement between Turkey and the United States about the sectors in which these zones would operate.
Turkey wanted inclusion of textile sector in the project whereas the United States proposed that the zones should intensify on the advanced technology products by showing the strong textile lobby in the congress as a reason.
Non-inclusion of the textile sector in the project since that day reduced insistence of Turkey on this project while the United States tried to accelerate the infrastructural works that it had undertaken.
The House of Representatives passed the project last October as a part of a wider trade law but the project could not be voted by the Senate before the congressional elections in November and the vote was to be held by the new congress.
It had been claimed that some development was recorded in inclusion of textile sector in this project during the intense economic talks which were carried out by the Turkish and U.S. sides in January and February in connection with the Iraq crisis.
(BRC-AÖ) 14.05.2003