then have to be approved by the Congress with the possibility of amendments, which would hinder the US negotiators and decrease the willingness of other countries to participate. Hong Kong offered to mediate the collapsed trade liberalisation talks. Director-general of Trade and Industry, Raymond Young, says the territory, which hosted the last round of Doha negotiations, has a "moral high-ground" on free trade that allows it to play the role of "honest broker". Potsdam, 2007 In June 2007, negotiations within the Doha round broke down at a conference in Potsdam, as a major impasse occurred between the US, the EU, India and Brazil. The main disagreement was over opening up agricultural and industrial markets in various countries and how to cut rich nation farm subsidies. Geneva, 2008 On 21 July 2008, negotiations started again at the WTO's HQ in Geneva on the Doha round but stalled after nine days of negotiations over the refusal to compromise over the special safeguard mechanism. "Developing country members receive special and differential treatment with respect to other members' safeguard measures, in the form of a de minimis import volume exemption. As users of safeguards, developing country members receive special and differential treatment with respect to applying their own such measures, with regard to permitted duration of extensions, and with respect to re-application of measures. Negotiations had continued since the last conference in June 2007. Director-general Pascal Lamy said before the start of the conference that the odds of success were over 50%. Around 40 ministers attended the negotiations, which were only expected to last five days but instead lasted nine days. Kamal Nath, India's Commerce Minister, was absent from the first few days of the conference due to a vote of confidence being conducted in India's Parliament. On the second day of the conference, U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab announced that the US would cap its farm subsidies at $15 billion a year, from $18.2 billion in 2006. The proposal was on the condition that countries such as Brazil and India drop their objections to various aspects of the round. The US and the EU also offered an increase in the number of temporary work visas for professional workers. After one week of negotiations, many considered agreement to be 'within reach'. However, there were disagreements on issues including special protection for Chinese and Indian farmers and African and Caribbean banana imports to the EU.