1.   Meetings begin in Seattle Thursday and close Saturday morning, when QUAD members will hold a news press conference.

2.   The Kobe telecom talks ultimately foundered on the unwillingness of Quad members to abolish all protection of their telecom carriers.

3.   Canada, whose telecommmunications market is the smallest of the four quad members, has opposed the opening of its markets to foreign companies.

4.   The aim, they said, was to prevent China from playing the QUAD members off against another.

5.   German Economics Minister Gunter Rexrodt said Quad members had invited interested countries to join them for expert-level talks on ways of breaking the ITA impasse.