By Katherine Stanley, Tico Times Staff

Legislators from the Citizen Action Party (PAC) yesterday presented a 530-page document explaining their opposition to the Central American Free-Trade Agreement with the United States (CAFTA).

The bottom line: the party, which, with 17 seats in the legislature, is second only to the National Liberation Party (PLN) in congressional heft, says Costa Rica should scrap the existing agreement and negotiate a new one that better protects the country’s identity and public institutions.

Legislator Ronald Solís said CAFTA should be cast aside entirely and negotiation should begin afresh.

The United States is “always going to be interested,” he said at a press conference held at the assembly just before Solís, faction head Elizabeth Fonseca and Francisco Molina, all PAC lawmakers and members of the International Relations Commission, presented the document to the legislature’s secretariat across the hall. Its position statement will join the pro-CAFTA arguments of Liberation, the Libertarian Movement and the Social Christian Unity Party (PUSC) as the basis for discussion of the pact on the legislative floor, expected to begin later this month.

The International Relations Commission voted to send CAFTA to the assembly floor in December.

PAC’s presentation marks the last step, aside from the publication of the position statements and republication of CAFTA itself in the official government daily La Gaceta, before the full assembly can begin debating the controversial agreement. Its proponents, including President Oscar Arias, say the pact would improve Costa Rica’s access to the U.S. market and create new opportunities for the country, while PAC members and other critics say the country ceded too much – namely, the opening of its state-owned telecommunications and insurance monopolies to private competition – in the negotiation process, conducted in 2003-2004.

“This process has been incredible, because it’s been a school – we have so much knowledge now that we didn’t have when we started (negotiations),” Solís said as he argued that CAFTA should be shelved and new talks begun. “Now we’re more prepared… Today we have a culture of treaty negotiation.”

The full text of the document will be released to the press Friday.