Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Clinton denies trying to delay GATT deal Date: Mon, 26 Oct 92 14:37:03 EST Message-ID: \SE A;NATION \HD Clinton denies trying to delay GATT deal \BY Ronald A. Taylor \CR THE WASHINGTON TIMES \DT STERLING HEIGHTS, Mich. STERLING HEIGHTS, Mich. - Bill Clinton denied a London newspaper's report yesterday that his emissaries had arranged to delay a European trade agreement until after the election so President Bush wouldn't be able to claim credit for it. "Nothing to that," the Democratic presidential nominee said as he began a day of campaigning in Michigan, according to Associated Press. "The story is bogus," said Bruce Reed, a key Clinton campaign policy official. "There's no October surprise, no secret missions." According to the story in the London Sunday Telegraph, Clinton campaign officials asked for and got an agreement with European Community officials to delay the final shape of revisions to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) until after the election. President Bush used the report in a Farm Belt campaign appearance yesterday. "If this report is true and if the Clinton campaign is going over to Europe, interfering with an agreement that would benefit all American agriculture, it is a sorry, pathetic thing to be doing a few days before an election," Mr. Bush told a campaign rally in Sioux Falls, S.D. The Telegraph reported that EC president Jacques Delors had made a secret arrangement with Mr. Clinton to delay the trade agreement. Citing unnamed senior Brussels agriculture sources, the paper said Clinton campaign officials contacted Mr. Delors two weeks ago when it appeared that the trade talks would be successful. The Brussels sources stressed that Mr. Delors "was mainly driven to scotch the deal because of the protests of French farmers." But the sources said the Socialist would prefer Mr. Clinton, a Democrat, in the White House on grounds of ideology, and "he was doubly happy to cooperate," the Sunday Telegraph reported. EC sources told AP last week that Mr. Bush wants a deal that can boost his campaign, and EC negotiators want to take advantage of Washington's hurry. The Clinton campaign's Mr. Reed suggested the Telegraph story stemmed from offhand, unauthorized remarks by a Clinton supporter in Washington to the Dutch ambassador to the U.S. Mr. Reed said Kevin Mieler, an attorney with the firm of Arnold and Porter, mentioned to the ambassador that the American election could produce a new president and that the final shape of the agreement regarding the relationship of U.S. and European trading partners should reflect any such change. "We didn't know he was doing it and we were angry about it," Mr. Reed said. The attorney is not officially connected with the campaign, he added. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM