On August 18, 2009, the World Trade Organization's (WTO) top court, the Appellate Body, issued its report regarding compliance in the complaint by Japan in the case " United States - Measures Relating to Zeroing and Sunset Reviews", involving the US' method of dealing with unfairly priced imports.
In its report, the WTO upheld the ruling by the judicial panel report, issued on April 2009, that the US failed to comply with the Dispute Settlement Body's (DSB) recommendations and rulings in the dispute, was inconsistent in its use of zeroing in trade cases, and is in violation of its obligations under the 1994 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) agreement.
The Appellate Body has said in the ruling report, "To the extent that the US has failed to comply with recommendations and rulings of the DSB in the original proceedings, they remain operative."
"The Appellate Body recommends that the DSB request the US to implement fully the recommendations and rulings of the DSB," the report added.
The appeal court has consistently ruled against zeroing, which is opposed by all the WTO's 153 members except the US. However, it has now upheld the original compliance panel finding that the US had wrongly continued to base its assessment of antidumping duties on imports of steel products from Japan on zeroing after the reasonable period of time it was given to comply with the rulings.
The U.S. had also argued it could continue to levy duties on goods that had entered the country before a WTO ruling finding such duties illegal, however this stance has been rejected by the court.