Sunday July 2, 8:32 pm Eastern Time
Japan, U.S. set to agree on NTT fee cut-newspaper
TOKYO, July 3 (Reuters) - Japan and the United States are expected to resolve this
month a dispute over connection rates charged by Japan's former domestic phone
monopoly, the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper reported on Monday.
Quoting unnamed Japanese and U.S. officials in Washington, Japan's top-selling
newspaper said the two sides are likely to agree that Nippon Telegraph and Telephone
Corp (NTT) cut the rates it charges rivals to link to its local lines by around 28 percent by
the end of 2002.
Tokyo and Washington are also expected to agree to discuss further rate cuts ``in light of
NTT's business performance'', the Yomiuri said.
Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and U.S. President Bill Clinton will likely formally sign the deal when they hold talks on
the sidelines of a July 21-23 Group of Eight summit in Japan.
Washington has demanded the rates be slashed immediately by 41 percent while Tokyo has offered a 22.5 percent cut over
four years. Unofficially, both sides have floated compromise proposals but they failed to bridge the gap at talks in March.
Japan and the United States will open talks in Tokyo on July 10 to try to clinch a deal ahead of the G8 summit.
Japan's Posts and Telecommunications Minister Eita Yashiro said on Friday that NTT should speed up its proposed rate cuts.
But NTT balked at that suggestion, saying a speedier timetable would prevent one of its regional units, NTT West, of
achieving profitability in the year beginning April 1, 2002.
``If the rate is cut by 22.5 percent over four years, NTT West can still be profitable as planned in 2002/03, but if the rate cut
were to be made in two to three years, it would would not be able to do so,'' an NTT executive told reporters.
Failure to settle the spat could be embarrassing for Mori, who plans to make Information Technology the centrepiece of the
G8 summit of rich nations and Russia.
The United States has threatened to file a complaint with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) by the end of July if Tokyo
refuses to cut the fees, which Washington says bolster NTT's iron grip on the world's second-largest telecoms market. |
