Tashfeen, Z. (2018). The WTO and Its Failure to Create a Level Playing Field between Developed and Developing Nations. RSIL Law Review, 2018, 105–115.The World Trade Organization (WTO) was created in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) Uruguay round in 1995. Whilst GATT only dealt with trade in goods, the WTO went further to encompass trade in services through the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS); intellectual property rights through the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). Recently, the Doha and Bali rounds have also included development and trade facilitation to the ambit of the WTO. The World Trade Organization had set out some laudable objectives it sought to achieve: to make trade free and fair through negotiations; to ensure predictability through transparency; and to help developing countries increase their capacities to benefit from a liberalized trade regime. Based on these objectives, the organization had immense potential. However, as will be seen in the course of this article, the World Trade Organization has time and again failed to provide a level playing field between the developed and developing nations, by enacting rules that benefit the rich over the poor countries. In other words it has "become little more than a smokescreen for the pursuit of private interests and the subordination of developing countries to the dictates of rich countries".