Saudi Arabia has made surprisingly quick progress in talks on joining the World Trade Organisation and should be a member by the end of the year, WTO chief Supachai Panitchpadki has said.
He said the world's biggest oil producer was close to finalising an agreement with a WTO working group on accession. Remaining bilateral differences with the United States and three other WTO members were "not insurmountable", he added.
Mr Supachai said Saudi Arabia was very close to winning approval from the WTO working group. "We are working on the draft proposal," he told reporters after addressing an economic conference in the Red Sea trading city of Jeddah.
"The comments that I have been hearing is that there should not be much more revision to be done. So it is close to the final stage," he said. "The bilateral negotiations that Saudi Arabia has been conducting have moved very quickly, rather more quickly than I have expected," Mr Supachai added.
The Gulf state, one of the largest economies still outside the global trade group, has pushed hard in recent months to finalise accession talks and had hoped to join early this year.
But the United States, Thailand, Switzerland and Norway have yet to reach agreement on market access for their goods and officials say another 10 countries have yet to formally accept Saudi membership.
Asked when he expected Saudi Arabia to finally join the WTO Supachai said: "I would say within this year."
He declined to specify the remaining obstacles to agreement with the United States but said one issue under discussion was financial sector market access.
"Most of the time in negotiating access with the United States it's mainly services sectors like financial and insurance (that) are always part of some of the tough discussion, but they are not insurmountable."
One recent stumbling block which Saudi Arabia had overcome was codifying trade laws in a way which met WTO standards and was acceptable in the conservative Muslim kingdom - a problem mentioned by a senior US official just last month.
"I think this has been overcome and it is a major breakthrough," Mr Supachai said.
Saudi WTO talks have dragged on for eight years and were suspended for a time because of opposition among powerful religious authorities, diplomats close to the talks have said.
Saudi supporters of WTO membership have frequently had to deny accusations that trade liberalisation would prevent the kingdom, the birthplace of Islam, from upholding strict bans on the import of pork, alcohol or pornography.
The talks have gained new urgency as the Gulf state launched a wave of cautious political and economic reforms aimed at creating jobs for its rapidly expanding population, diversifying its oil-based economy, and tackling a wave of militant attacks.
"Starting from last year we've done a tremendous amount of work in a very short period of time," Mr Supachai said.