Ceta
failure deepens EU trade crisis
By ERIC MAURICE
BRUSSELS, 21. OCT,
17:58
Talks to accommodate
Wallonia and sign an EU-Canada trade deal, next week, ended in
failure on Friday (21 October), putting further doubts on the EU's
capacity to conduct a trade policy.
"It seems
obvious that the EU is not capable to have an international agreement
even with a country that has values that are so European, with a
country that is as nice and as patient as Canada," Canadian
international trade minister Chrystie Freedland said while announcing
she was going back home.
She said it was
"impossible" to find an agreement with the Belgian region's
leadership over a declaration to give guarantees on some elements of
the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (Ceta).
Earlier on Friday,
Wallonia's minister-president Paul Magnette, backed by the region's
parliament, said that he wanted more details on a settlement
mechanism and public services.
Wallonia's consent
was necessary to allow the Belgian government to back Ceta, and in
turn allowing the EU to formally sign the deal at an EU-Canada summit
next week.
However; the
European Commission said on Friday evening, that the talks failure
did not mean the end of the agreement.
Ceta's apparent
failure came just hours after EU leaders reaffirmed their commitment
to free trade, but admitted they had to "take into account the
concerns of [European] citizens."
The discussion at an
EU summit in Brussels had been planned for a long time, but "Ceta
cast a shadow" on the meeting, an EU official said.
Leaders were updated
several times about the talks in Namur between the Walloon
government, Canada, and the European Commission, and the region's
parliament's debate.
Faced with a growing
popular opposition to free-trade deals such as Ceta and the in the
works Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) with the
US, EU leaders insisted that "many millions of jobs in the EU
depend on trade, which is and will remain a powerful engine for
growth."
They added that "EU
trade interests include fully defending and promoting the social,
environmental and consumer standards that are central to the European
way of life, as well as the right of governments to regulate."
A senior diplomat
pointed to opposition to EU trade policies as part of "the
growing contestation of the negative consequences of globalisation,
of which trade deals are considered a vector".
He noted that trade
negotiations used to be on goods and market access and were mainly
about the level of protection for producers. Now they are about
services and environmental, social, consumers issues, and consumers
and citizens are more concerned than companies.
Litmus test
To regain support
for free trade, the EU must "demonstrate that new agreements
contribute to the regulation of economy that we need to have,"
the diplomat said.
While TTIP had been
the main targets of trade critics in recent years, the signature
process for Ceta and Walloon resistance makes the EU-Canada deal a
litmus test for Europe.
Ceta "could be
our last free trade agreement, if we are not able to convince people
that we negotiate to protect their interests," European Council
president Donald Tusk warned on Thursday.
"The debate is
about which globalisation we want," Wallonia's leader Paul
Magnette said on Friday.
But this argument is
lost on one official.
"I am
astonished that when we conclude a trade agreement with Vietnam,
which is known worldwide for applying all democratic principles,
nobody raises his voice. Whereas if we conclude an agreement with
Canada, which as we know is an accomplished dictatorship, everybody
gets excited to tell us that we don't respect human rights and
economic rights," Juncker said ironically on Friday.
EU leaders tasked on
Friday the commission with pursuing talks with Japan and the US. But
on a cautious note asked the EU executive to "be able to
present" an "ambitious, balanced and comprehensive"
TTIP agreement, while in earlier versions of the summit conclusions
the commission was merely asked to "conclude" the deal.
It is the first time
that no commitment on a date is taken, but it is "an
acknowledgment of reality," the diplomat said. "The gap is
too wide" between EU and US positions.
Trade defence
As a way to reassure
citizens on the impact of free trade, EU leaders also said insisted
that "unfair trade practices need to be tackled efficiently and
robustly."
They discussed the
so-called trade defence instruments to protect EU economy from trade
dumping, especially on Chinese products.
A proposal to
strengthen anti-dumping measures have been blocked in the council of
EU trade ministers since 2013, especially over the issue of a lesser
duty rule, by which tariffs are imposed at the lowest level possible.
The UK, Britain and
Nordic countries still resist an increase in tariffs, which other
countries led by France and Germany are pushing for.
"'Effective
trade defence instruments should be proportionate, not
protectionist," a UK source said, while British prime minister
Theresa May insisted that they should be decided in the "interest
of users, producers and consumers."
On the opposite,
Juncker said that the EU should not abstain from imposing high
tariffs "if Americans and others are doing these things."
"We are not
protectionist, but we are not naive," he told journalists after
the meeting.
Diplomats said that
the discussion on trade defence between leaders who share the same
concerns over the overall trade policies allowed a "change of
atmosphere" that could lead to an agreement at ministers level
later this year.
Backlash
The focus on the
lesser duty rule was shifted to a more political call for "a
comprehensive modernisation of all trade defence instruments."
Besides concerns
over the popularity of trade deals, the political aspect of the
discussion was reinforced by the looming deadline to decide whether
the EU grants China a market economy status (MES).
The MES issue was
discussed only on the sidelines, several leaders mentioning Chinese
dumping in discussions.
While protecting
Europe from cheaper goods is an issue, the failure on Ceta shows that
the way the EU negotiates trade deals needs to be reviewed.
International trade
deals are an exclusive power of the EU commission. That leads to
reproaches of a lack of transparency, with a backlash when national
politicians or NGOs start looking into the details.
In the end, a
3.5-million strong Belgian region negotiated directly with Canada and
doomed an agreement that had been under discussion for seven years.
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