Bush faces "litmus test" on Chinese textile dilemma

[Nambe]

Associated Press

Over the next several months, the Bush administration could send its strongest signal yet about how it plans to handle conflicts between the struggling American textile industry and China, which it is trying to appease as a new favored trading partner.

On Monday, the administration will open a 60-day comment period to consider three petitions by textile companies asking it to restore quotas on certain Chinese clothing imports that were removed Jan. 1, 2001, as a condition of China's membership in the World Trade Organization.

After that, the Committee for the Implementation of Textile Agreements - a coalition of five federal agencies - will vote on whether to impose the quotas for a year on knit fabrics, cotton and manmade fiber dressing gowns and robes, and cotton and manmade fiber brasseries. -