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According to 'Inside U.S. Trade', Torrijos will travel to Washington in September. External Trade
This year, the CPC depends on a 'lame duck'

It is anticipated that the Democrats will increase their majority in both houses in the upcoming elections. Failure to do the extraordinary session, the CPC is engavetado until next year.

BLOOMBERG State of the Union. This year, both the Senate and the House of Representatives under the control of demócratas.1078946

Betty Brannan Jaen
Correspondent LaprensaDC@aol.com

Every day there are more indications that the only possibility that the U.S. ratify the Treaty of Trade Promotion (CPC) this year that Congress will hold an extraordinary session of "lame duck", which does not look likely. What Americans call "a lame duck session" (in English, a lame duck session) is an extraordinary session of Congress held after the presidential and legislative elections in November, but before the new government takes office in January .

The phrase "lame duck" underlines that this is the last session of a Congress with many lawmakers about to leave, either by retirement or defeat. This year the situation is that both the Senate and the House of Representatives are controlled by the Democrats and it is anticipated that the Democrats will increase their majority in both chambers in the upcoming elections.

Therefore, the Democratic leaders of both chambers-controlling the legislative agenda-have already declared they have little interest in convening an extraordinary session "lame duck" which only serve the political interests of the government of George W. Bush. Failure to do the extraordinary session, the CPC is engavetado until next year, to be submitted to the next Congress. Right now, Congress is on summer recess in September and will meet only about three weeks before going into recess campaign. The president Martín Torrijos will go to Washington in mid-September to boost the TPC but, as noted by the newsletter Inside U.S. Trade recently, that does not give enough time for Congress to take action on the TPC before closing sessions.

From the U.S. side, it is clear that American officials have understood this reality and are pressing for an meeting "lame duck" to approve the pending treaty with Colombia, Panama and Korea. The Colombia, in particular, is about to collapse as it was submitted to Congress, will die if not addressed this year. The secretary of the U.S. Trade said last week that a meeting "lame duck" is the only "window" remains open to agreements Panama, Colombia and Korea are ratified in the remainder of the Bush administration. Of the Panamanian side, by contrast, Inside U.S. Trade commented recently that the Torrijos government "seems to be confident" in which the CPC will be submitted to Congress later this year.