The World Trade Organization's highest court struck down an earlier verdict that the United States had not violated trade rules in asserting that Canadian softwood lumber exports hurt U.S. producers.

But the Appellate Body declined to make its own ruling on the legality of the U.S. measures. Canada ships about $6 billion in softwood lumber such as spruce, fir and pine to the U.S. each year.

 

A panel of WTO judges ruled in November that Washington had breached no rules when the U.S. International Trade Commission decided its lumber industry risked being hurt by dumped and subsidized imports from Canada.