tal to ensuring a fair and orderly conduct of dispute settlement proceedings”.3
Most importantly, as noted by the Appellate Body in EC-Bananas (DS27), “[i]f a claim is not specified in the request for the establishment of a panel, then a faulty request cannot be subsequently ‘cured’ by a complaining party's argumentation in its first written submission to the panel or in any other submission or statement made later in the panel proceeding”. 4
However, as ruled by the Appellate Body in EC-Bananas (DS27), Art. 6.2 of the DSU requires that “the claims, but not the arguments”, must all be specified sufficiently in the request for the establishment of a panel. With this regard, the Appellate Body rules that, “… [i]n our view, there is a significant difference between the claims identified in the request for the establishment of a panel, which establish the panel's terms of reference under Article 7 of the DSU, and the arguments supporting those claims, which are set out and progressively clarified in the first written submissions, the rebuttal submissions and the first and second panel meetings with the parties”.5 And the Panel in Thailand-Iron and H-Beams (DS122) rules further that, “Article 6.2 DSU does not relate directly to the sufficiency of the subsequent written and oral submission

s of the parties in the course of the proceedings, which may develop the arguments in support of the claims set out in the panel request. Nor does it determine whether or not the complaining party will manage to establish a prima facie case of violation of an obligation under a covered agreement in the actual course of the panel proceedings”.6
Now we turn on to the connotation of Art. 6.2. In this connection, the Panel in Japan-Film（DS44）rules that, “we examine, as appropriate, (i) the ordinary meaning of the terms of Article 6.2; (ii) the context and the object and purpose of Article 6.2; and (iii) past practice under Article 6.2 and its predecessor provision”.7 Specifically, as ruled by the Appellate Body in Korea-Dairy Products（DS98）, “[w]hen parsed into its constituent parts, Article 6.2 may be seen to impose the following requirements. The request must: (i) be in writing; (ii) indicate whether consultations were held; (iii) identify the specific measures at issue; and (iv) provide a brief summary of the legal basis of the complaint sufficient to present the problem clearly.”8
And in these four requirements, it is only element (i), that the request “be in writing” has hardly been disagreed; and as to be discussed in more detail below, the other three elements (ii)- (iv) have often been the subjects divergent between participants on many occasions.

II Indication of Consultations Process
In its second element, Art. 6.2 of the DSU requires that the panel request must “indicate whether consultations were held”. In this connection, the Appellate Body rules in Mexico-HFCS（DS132）（21.5）that:9
“[…] The phrase ‘whether consultations were held’ shows that this requirement in Article 6.2 may be satisfied by an express statement that no consultations were held. In other words, Article 6.2 also envisages the possibility that a panel may be validly established without being preceded by consultations.
Thus, the DSU explicitly recognizes circumstances where the absence of consultations would not deprive the panel of its authority to consider the matter referred to it by the DSB. In

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