“South Korea and ASEAN countries will start cutting tariffs on merchandise trade by Jan. 1, 2007, but talks with the group’s key member Thailand remains stalled amid a dispute over rice, ministers said Thursday. The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations _ except Thailand _ signed an agreement in May to start freeing up trade in goods as part of plans to create a free trade area by 2012. Thailand, the world’s top rice exporter, refused to join to protest South Korea’s insistence on excluding rice.”

Source Houston Chronicle