PART 2!!!!1 Apr 2007 18:25
Friday that the latest decision was a setback.
"The compliance panel did not agree with the United States that we had taken the necessary steps to comply with the WTO recommendations," said Gretchen Hamel, a spokeswoman for the office of the U.S. Trade Representative. She added, however, that "nothing in the panel's report undermines the broad, favorable results that the United States obtained from the WTO in April 2005."
Washington still has yet to say if it will appeal the compliance panel's findings. A final ruling upholding Antigua's claims would allow the twin-island nation to seek trade sanctions on the United States for its failure to comply.
To avoid the penalties, the U.S. government would then have to either permit Americans to gamble over foreign-based sites or eliminate exceptions for off-track betting on horses, including over the Internet, as permitted under the 1978 Interstate Horseracing Act.
Nevertheless, it appears unlikely that the U.S. will ease access to companies with servers licensed in the nation of 80,000 people -- whose legal efforts were largely bankrolled by British-owned Internet gambling operators.
The U.S. Congress caught the industry by surprise last year when it added a provision to a bill aimed at improving port security that would make it illegal for banks and credit card companies to settle payments to online gambling sites. President George Bush signed it into law on Oct. 14.
The decision closed