World Trade Organisation (WTO) general council chairperson Shahid Bashir on Monday announced that Herminio Blanco, of Mexico, and Roberto Carvalho de Azevêdo, of Brazil, had progressed to the final round of the organisation’s director-general selection process.

Speaking at a meeting of heads of delegation, Bashir indicated that the final phase of the consultation process would start on May 1 and end on May 7, after which he and a group of facilitators would make a recommendation to the general council regarding their choice of who should succeed Pascal Lamy as WTO director-general.

The outcome of the third and final round would be announced on May 8.

During the second round of consultations, which took place between April 16 and 24, three candidates had withdrawn. These three candidates were Mari Elka Pangestu, of Indonesia; New Zealand’s Tim Groser and Taeho Bark from the Republic of Korea.

“I would like to pay tribute to the governments of Indonesia, New Zealand and the Republic of Korea, and to the respective Geneva representatives for contributing to this process with dignity and fairness. They have reaffirmed once again their firm commitment to the multilateral trading system and I believe that the WTO has greatly benefited from it,” Bashir said in a statement.