Saudi, Briton join race for top WTO post

GENEVA (AP) – Britain and Saudi Arabia put forward late entries Wednesday for the contest to become the next director-general of the World Trade Organization, joining six others hoping to lead the Geneva-based trade body that has faced scorn and pressure from the Trump administration.

The candidacies came in just before the deadline in the race to succeed the current WTO chief, Brazil’s Roberto Azevedo. He made a surprise announcement in May that he would leave the job a year early, citing a “personal decision.”

Saudi Arabia nominated former economy minister and longtime banker Mohammad Maziad Al-Tuwaijri, while Britain announced the candidacy of former international trade secretary and Brexit proponent Liam Fox.

The other candidates for the job are: Jesús Seade Kuri of Mexico, who helped negotiate a new trade deal between the US, Canada and Mexico; Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who has been Nigeria’s finance minister and spent 25 years at the World Bank; Abdel-Hamid Mamdouh of Egypt, a longtime trade negotiator; Tudor Ulianovschi, a former foreign minister for Moldova; Yoo Myung-hee of South Korea, a minister for trade; and Amina Mohamed, a former foreign affairs and trade minister of Kenya.

The time frame for the election has not been decided yet. The WTO chief is chosen by consensus by its 164 member states, based on a recommendation from its selection committee.

Azevedo has said he’ll leave on Aug. 31.

The WTO, which was created in 1995 out of the former General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, has never had a woman director-general or national from Africa as its leader.

Azevedo is ending a sevenyear tenure marked in recent years by intense pressure from US President Donald Trump, who repeatedly accused the WTO of “unfair” treatment of the US and started a trade war with China in defiance of the WTO system.