only increase the risk of trade or investor disputes, but would also concede the very legal ground that we believe Canada might successfully defend. 6.2 International Initiatives For these reasons we believe that the immediate priority should be to implement domestic export controls. With a sound statutory framework then in place, the next step would be for Canada to pursue international measures to both strengthen these domestic initiatives, and avert the risk of trade challenges and investor claims concerning such measures. In our view these fall into two generic categories. The first is to seek an exclusion, exception or waiver for such measures in accordance with the requirements of the particular trade or investment agreement. These exclusions may in turn be specific to particular provisions or, better still, apply across the board as general exceptions to, or exclusions from, the entirety of the particular trade agreement. The other possible approach would be to negotiate an international agreement dealing specifically with water that would explicitly supercede Canadian trade and investment obligations and take precedence in the event of conflicts with them. These two options are not mutually exclusive and should in our view be pursued as part of a comprehensive strategy that would ideally integrate the two approaches. 6.1.2 Protection from WTO Based ClaimsAs we have seen, the most problematic conflicts between water export controls and Canadian trade and investment commitments arise under, and are unique to, NAFTA. Thus while the WTO includes and an Agreement on Trade-Related Investment Measures it represents a bare rudimentary framework that engenders neither a commitment to National Treatment nor provisions concerning expropriation. The same is true of the skeletal WTO Agreement on Trade in Services (GATs). However the GATs is on the agenda for the next Ministerial meeting that will take place later this year in Seattle, and...
