UPDATE 1-WTO needs progress on ‘non-market’ practices, dispute settlement -USTR’s Tai

U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai on Friday called for meaningful progress in making changes to the World Trade Organization by a ministerial meeting in February, with better tools needed to handle China's "non-market" practices. The U.S. was committed to a reformed WTO that was focused on its "foundational goals," marked by "openness, transparency, and fair-market-oriented competition", Tai said in remarks to a trade forum in Washington. She said that in recent years, the WTO has failed to address non-market practices by some countries, seeking to "dominate key industrial sectors, promote national champions and discriminate foreign competitors, massively subsidize key sectors and manipulate cost structures."