Peru's response to Democratic Proposal: No Thanks

In response to the much trumpeted Rangel-Levin trade proposal, Peru's trade minister has simple response: thanks but no thanks.

According to the leading Spanish language newswire EFE, the Peruvian government said this on the Democrat's limited proposal to re-negotiate the flawed Bush trade pact:

Some Democratic Party leaders are demanding that the Peru FTA include more worker and environmental protections, and guarantees of access to generic drugs.

Nevertheless, Araoz insists that Peru will not accept a re-opening of the pact negotiations, which were ratified by its legislature last year.

"We can talk about some additional thing in some side letter, we're in agreement on that, but we can't second guess our own Congress, which already approved it," she explained.

For the reasons why side deals are very very bad ideas and unenforceable, see Brandon and my Trade Wars: Revenge of the Myth paper. You can read more analysis of the Rangel-Levin proposal here.