WP “李대통령, 한미 FTA 관련 ‘양보’ 약속했다”
노컷뉴스 | 입력 2010.08.24 02:03 | 수정 2010.08.24 04:30

[워싱턴=CBS 박종률 특파원]

대선후보 시절 한미 자유무역협정(FTA)에 비판적 입장이었던 버락 오바마 미국 대통령이 이명박 대통령으로부터 한미 FTA와 관련해 ‘더 많은 양보(more concessions)’를 하겠다는 약속을 받아냈다고 워싱턴포스트가 23일(현지시간) 보도했다.

WP는 이날 1면과 10면에 게재한 ‘미국의 국정 어젠다로 복귀한 한국과의 자유무역협정’이라는 제하의 기사를 통해 오바마 대통령이 수출확대와 일자리창출을 최우선 정책 과제로 설정하면서 한미 FTA가 오바마 행정부의 국정 어젠다로 재부상했다고 분석하면서 이같이 전했다.

WP는 “오바마 대통령이 (미국의) 중간선거가 끝난 뒤 오는 11월 (서울에서 개최되는 G20 정상회의에서) 한국 지도자와 만났을 때 (한미 FTA의) 수정이나 개정 문제를 논의하길 원하고 있다”고 덧붙였다.

앞서 오바마 대통령은 지난 6월 캐나다 토론회에서 열린 한미정상회담에서 한미 FTA 비준 문제와 관련해 오는 11월 주요 20개국 정상회의 전까지 주요 쟁점을 정리하고, 내년 초 의회의 비준동의를 받겠다는 시간표를 제시한 바 있다.

WP는 이어 최근 한미 FTA의 필요성을 홍보하고 있는 한덕수 주미대사의 활동을 소개하면서 “한 대사가 미국의 일자리 확대라는 ‘독특한 역할’을 맡았다”고 전했다.

WP에 따르면 ‘한미 FTA 아웃리치’ 행사의 일환으로 앨라배마, 일리노이, 미시간주 등을 순회중인 한 대사는 한미 FTA로 인해 미국의 일자리가 없어질 것이라는 우려를 불식시키는 데 주력하고 있다.

특히 한 대사는 최근 한 행사에서 “서울에서 더 많은 포드와 제너럴모터스의 자동차를 보고 싶다”고 말하기도 하는 등 한미 FTA를 적극 세일즈하고 있다.

한 대사와 함께 론 커크 美무역대표부(USTR) 대표도 경기침체로 타격을 받고 있는 도시와 지역을 방문해 “무역을 제대로 하면 미국은 이길 수 있다”고 강조하며 FTA에 대한 설득작업을 이어가고 있다.

다만 WP는 한미 FTA가 1990년 중반 멕시코, 캐나다와 체결한 북미자유무역협정(NAFTA)이후 가장 중요한 FTA로 인식되면서 찬반론자들간의 무역논쟁이 빚어지고 있다고 지적했다.

즉, 찬성론자들은 부시 전임 행정부가 체결한 한미 FTA가 연간 100억달러의 수출증가와 일자리 창출을 견인할 것이라고 주장하고 있지만 반대론자들은 한국이 자동차와 쇠고기 시장의 접근을 제한하고 비관세 장벽까지 있어 자유무역의 효과가 크지 않다고 반박하고 있다고 신문은 설명했다.

실제로 노조와 환경단체 등은 오바마 대통령의 대선 당시 공약 이행을 촉구하고 있으며, 지난달 민주당 하원의원 100여명도 오바마에게 보낸 서한을 통해 “현행 한미 FTA는 ‘일자리 죽이기’이자 ‘또 다른 NAFTA식 FTA’”라고 규정하며 현재의 형태로는 한미 FTA를 지지하지 않겠다는 입장을 분명히 했다고 WP는 전했다.

한미 FTA에 비판적인 입장을 취해온 소비자보호단체 ‘퍼블릭 시티즌’의 로리 월러크는 “(의회가 선택할 수 있는 길은) 최소한의 수정작업을 거쳐 부시 행정부가 체결한 한미 FTA 내용을 추진하는 것과 오바마 대통령이 대선 운동기간에 약속한 새 모델로 바꾸는 두 가지의 길이 있다”고 말했다.

WP는 이와 함께 한국과 대만 등은 영향력을 증대하고 있는 중국에 맞서 역내에서 미국의 역할이 보다 활성화하길 필요로 하고 있어 미국과 아시아 국가의 무역확대는 미국의 존재를 강화하는 데 도움이 될 수 있다고 분석했다.

그러나 한국은 미국이 FTA를 비준하기만을 단지 기다리면서 오히려 유럽연합(EU)이나 다른 국가들과 무역협상을 벌이고 있고, 이에 미국 기업체 간부들은 미국 기업들이 낙오될 수 있음을 우려하고 있다고 신문은 전했다.

미 상공회의소의 태미 오버비 아시아담당 부회장은 “아시아는 호황을 누리고 있고, 역내 무역은 자유화하고 있다”면서 “무역협정들이 아시아에서 맹렬한 속도로 이뤄지고 있는데 정작 미국은 밖으로 밀려 있는 상황”이라고 말했다.

한편 주미 한국대사관 측은 이날 WP 기사와 관련해 “‘양보’라고 표현한 부분은 자동차와 쇠고기 문제와 관련해 대화를 할 수 있다는 한국측 입장을 자신들이 해석해서 그렇게 쓴 것 같다”면서 “한국이 한미FTA와 관련해 어떤 양보를 약속하거나 한 일은 전혀 없다”고 반박했다.
nowhere@cbs.co.kr

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South Korea free trade pact back on U.S. agenda

By Howard Schneider
Washington Post Staff Writer
출처 : [Washington Post]  Monday, August 23, 2010
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/22/AR2010082202474.html?wprss=rss_politics

NAPERVILLE, ILL. — The message may have been familiar recently when the local Chamber of Commerce took up a proposed free-trade agreement between South Korea and the United States.

“Wave the flag,” the speaker exhorted the audience. “This is an opportunity to stimulate the U.S. economy at no cost to U.S. taxpayers.”

But the man on the podium wasn’t the typical business booster. He was South Korean Ambassador Han Duk-soo, who has assumed the unusual role of a foreign official promoting U.S. jobs. With the Obama administration pledging a major new push to ratify the agreement, Han has gone on the stump in cities such as Montgomery, Ala., Peoria, Ill., and Detroit to build American support for free trade and allay concerns that his country is trying to snatch U.S. manufacturing jobs.

“I’d like to see more Ford and General Motors cars in Seoul,” said Han, a Harvard-educated economist and veteran Korean minister who can mix quips about the Cubs and White Sox with the arcana of tariff schedules.

For three years, since it was negotiated by the Bush administration, the free-trade agreement has languished in Congress. Now trade officials from both countries are trying to resolve the problems that have kept it bottled up, including a dispute over U.S. access to the South Korean auto market and restrictions on U.S. beef imposed after the mad cow scare several years ago.

The agreement would eventually eliminate tariffs between the two countries. Because those levies are typically higher on the South Korean side, administration officials estimate the deal could mean more than $10 billion annually in increased U.S. exports to Seoul and tens of thousands of new U.S. jobs. South Koreans say they would benefit from lower prices — some tariffs on food imports from the U.S. are as high as 40 percent — and a more efficient flow of investment in and out of their country.

U.S. opponents of the agreement argue it doesn’t do enough to benefit American industry, even as it gives South Korean businesses greater rights in the United States.

But the more fundamental dispute is over free trade itself. Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush had aggressively promoted it. Yet the appeal of free trade has waned amid large U.S. trade deficits and concerns that more American manufacturing jobs will disappear overseas at a time when unemployment remains stuck near 10 percent.

President Obama has placed a priority on export promotion, calling it a key to job growth, and embraced the agreement with South Korea as a opportunity to weigh in on the broader debate over trade policy and advance U.S. interests.

South Korea is an economic powerhouse, a member of the Group of 20 and home to major international brands such as Samsung, LG and Hyundai. Yet it remains in some ways a closed shop with extensive tariffs, a paltry share of its large auto market devoted to imports, and a notorious set of non-tariff barriers that has prompted companies such as Peoria-based Caterpillar to complain that their products are routinely excluded for minor regulatory problems.

Obama criticized the trade agreement as a presidential candidate but has won a commitment from South Korean President Lee Myung-bak for more concessions. Obama wants to have revisions or amendments to discuss with the Korean leader when they meet in November — after the midterm congressional elections.

U.S. Trade Representative Ronald Kirk, whose job more typically involves overseas negotiations, has mounted a domestic lobbying effort, visiting cities and districts hit hard by the recession to argue that “when you do trade right, America can win.”

“In some cases they think I am a three-headed monster” for raising an issue some feel has undercut the U.S. middle class, Kirk said at a recent briefing.

The South Korea agreement would be the most significant free-trade pact signed by the United States since the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada in the mid-1990s. And with the dispute over the South Korea agreement serving as a proxy for the larger trade debate in the United States, both advocates and opponents have mobilized.

The pact is “the acid test” for whether a larger trade agenda can be rejuvenated, said William C. Lane, a lobbyist for Caterpillar. Company executives project Caterpillar would significantly benefit from the agreement — the firm has less than 5 percent of South Korea’s heavy-equipment market — and hosted Han on a recent tour of its Peoria headquarters, where he met privately with top executives, visited a manufacturing facility and tried his hand driving one of Caterpillar’s massive D11T “earthmovers.”

Skeptics of the proposed agreement include some major corporate interests such as Ford Motor Co., which argues that the pact isn’t aggressive enough in trying to open the South Korean market. Ford officials, for instance, noted that imports now represent less than 5 percent of South Korea’s auto market.

Unions, environmental advocacy groups and other organizations, meanwhile, are urging Obama to keep his campaign promises and stiffen the terms for South Korean access to the U.S. market.

Last month, more than 100 Democratic members of Congress signed a letter asking to meet Obama and discuss the agreement. They characterized it as “job killing” and “another NAFTA-style FTA that we simply cannot support in its current form.”

“There are two ways to go, and they have to decide,” said Lori Wallach, executive director of the global trade division at Public Citizen, which is critical of several aspects of the Korea agreement. “Push forward Bush’s text with minimal fixes — that would have enormous policy and political fallout — or they start to translate that old policy into the new model promised in the campaign.”

There is more at stake than jobs and money. Asian nations outside China, particularly democracies such as Taiwan and South Korea, have been pressing for a more energetic U.S. presence in the region, worried they need a counterweight to their large and increasingly influential neighbor. Heightened U.S. trade with Asia would be part of that.

But Seoul is just waiting for the United States. South Korea is negotiating trade pacts with the European Union and others. U.S. business officials worry American companies could be left behind.

“Asia is booming. Regional trade is liberalizing,” said U.S. Chamber of Commerce Asia vice president Tami Overby, a longtime U.S. business activist in South Korea who helped coordinate the South Korean ambassador’s tour.

Trade agreements “are flying fast and furious in Asia,” she said. “These things are happening, and [the U.S.] is on the outside.”