| Abstract: | The objective of the compliance procedure is to ensure promptcompliance with the Dispute Settlement Body's (DSB) recommendationsand rulings through an expeditious procedure. In their assignment,the compliance panels are faced with competing considerationsof, on the one hand, ensuring Members the right of a "reasonableperiod of time" for implementing the DSB's recommendations andrulings and, on the other, ensuring prompt compliance. Compliancepanels have to pay due respect to the fact that an Article 21.5proceeding is not a new proceeding, which limits the scope ofwhich claims may be raised in those proceedings and restrictsthe determination of which measures are "measures taken to comply".In order to achieve those overall aims, compliance panels andthe Appellate Body have accepted that claims other than thoseraised in the original proceedings may be presented in complianceproceedings. Due process principles form an integral part ofthe Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU). The delicate taskof the panels and Appellate Body is to determine which claims,not raised in the original proceedings, are admissible in anArticle 21.5 proceeding. Compliance panels and the AppellateBody have established several limitations in order to limitthe ambit of potential claims and measures that may fall withinan expeditious Article 21.5 proceeding. However, the embracedapproach to determining which new claims, not raised in theoriginal proceedings, are to be considered in Article 21.5 proceedingsand which measures fall within the realm of measures taken tocomply bears the common characteristics of being subject toan extensive interpretation of Article 21.5 of the DSU. |
