President Donald Trump has the World Trade Organization in a chokehold, and the United States has made clear what he wants: no more judicial rulings that interpret WTO rules to Washington’s disadvantage.

Trump has effectively engineered a crisis in the WTO’s system of settling global disputes by vetoing all appointments of judges to its appeals chamber.

True to the president’s style, his ambassador to the Geneva-based body, Dennis Shea, is unapologetic about shrinking the supreme court of world trade to a size where it will struggle to function.

“The United States is not content to be complacent about this institution,” Shea told fellow WTO ambassadors this month.

“And the leadership that the United States will bring to the WTO in the coming months and years will consequently involve a good deal of straight talk and a willingness to be disruptive, where necessary, in the interest of contributing to a stronger, more effective, and more politically sustainable organization.”...

This was excerpted from the 18 May 2018 edition of Reuters Canada.