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United States Trade Representative Mickey Kantor today announced decisions and initiated actions in three important trade areas: Title VII -- discrimination in foreign government procurement; special 301 -- protection of intellectual property rights; and the continuation of a review of Japan's compliance with the provisions of our bilateral Supercomputer Agreement.

Today's decisions demonstrate the Administration's continued resolve to take strong measures to ensure comparable market access and intellectual property protection for U.S. products -- measures which are key to this Administration's policy of opening markets and creating trade opportunities for U.S. companies and jobs for U.S. workers.

Kantor's decision under Title VII of the 1988 Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act focused on Japan and two priority sectors identified in the U.S.-Japan Framework Agreement -- medical equipment and telecommunications. Kantor also announced that sanctions imposed against the European Union (EU) on May 28, 1993, for EU discrimination in the telecommunications sector will remain in force.

Kantor announced that USTR would not identify Japan under Title VII at this time but will review the situation in 60 days on the basis of Japanese actions in the interim. Noting that some progress was made at his meeting with former Foreign Minister and now Prime Minister Hata in Marrakech on April 15 towards resuming the Framework negotiations, including negotiations on telecommunications and medical technology government procurement, Kantor stated that "Much remains to be done." He specifically noted that "in deciding whether to identify Japan under Title VII in 60 days, we will assess the seriousness of any official Japanese response to the points that were discussed at the Marrakech meeting."

In addition, Kantor announced that sanctions would remain in force under Title VII against the EU. These sanctions were imposed on May 28, 1993, after the United States and