partners and the development of developing countries;
Desiring the early achievement of progressively
higher levels of liberalisation of trade in services
through successive rounds of multilateral negotiations
aimed at promoting the interests of all participants on a
mutually advantageous basis and at securing an overall
balance of rights and obligations, while giving due
respect to national policy objectives;
Recognizing the right of Members to regulate, and to
introduce new regulations, on the supply of services
within their territories in order to meet national policy
objectives and, given asymmetries existing with respect
to the degree of development of services regulations in
different countries, the particular need of developing
countries to exercise this right;
Desiring to facilitate the increasing participation of
developing countries in trade in services and the
expansion of their service exports including, inter alia,
through the strengthening of their domestic services
capacity and its efficiency and competitiveness;
Taking particular account of the serious difficulty of
the least-developed countries in view of their special
economic situation and their development, trade and
financial needs;
a
World Trade Organization, Results of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations: The Legal Texts (Geneva,
1995), annex 1B.
Hereby agree as follows: