\n<\/p>\n
The EU has finally agreed to implement its trade deal with the US after five hours of talks between members of the European parliament and member states in the hope of averting more tariffs threatened by Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
It means the agreement struck last July at the US president\u2019s Scottish golf course can now enter into force, removing import duties on most US goods entering the EU.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis means we will soon deliver on our part,\u201d said the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, welcoming the pact. \u201cTogether, we can ensure stable, predictable, balanced and mutually beneficial transatlantic trade.\u201d<\/p>\n
The agreement puts the bloc on track to meet Trump\u2019s 4 July deadline for ratification of the deal, which has already been implemented in the US.<\/p>\n
The trade commissioner, Maro\u0161 \u0160ef\u010dovi\u010d, said of the talks that ended at about 2am in Brussels: \u201cCollective effort. Strong result. Meaningful work. After more than five hours of intensive negotiations \u2026 the EU has shown that we are a reliable trading partner, while standing firm in defending the interests of European stakeholders.\u201d<\/p>\n
MEPs had twice frozen the process to ratify the deal in protest at Trump\u2019s threat of higher tariffs in January and then his threat to take control of Greenland.<\/p>\n
In a significant victory, MEPs forced the insertion of a clause warning that the EU could reinstall tariffs on American products such as motorbikes if the US did not drop tariffs on steel derivatives \u2013 products involving an element of steel \u2013 by the end of the year.<\/p>\n
Bernd Lange, the chair of the parliamentary trade committee, said this had been a \u201ctricky\u201d part of the negotiations that extended talks with the commission from midnight to 2am. He said the commission was \u201ca little bit nervous about this issue\u201d, an apparent reference to the fear of retaliation by Trump.<\/p>\n
Bar any further hiccups, the European parliament will vote on the deal on 16 or 17 June, Lange said.<\/p>\n
Although the US supreme court has already ruled that Trump\u2019s imposition of 15% tariffs on most EU exports was illegal, EU chiefs took the decision to honour the deal in an effort to stabilise the trading environment for businesses, including in the car industry, which had been hit with 27.5% tariffs.<\/p>\n
MEPs had demanded a sunset clause allowing the EU to end the deal on 31 March 2028 and a suspension clause if Trump broke his word and increased the 15% tariff rate.<\/p>\n
The transatlantic relationship is the EU\u2019s most significant, worth more than \u20ac1.8tn in 2025.<\/p>\n
The final text empowers the commission to trigger the suspension mechanism if the US fails to meet its commitments or disrupts trade and investment with the EU, including by \u201cdiscriminating against or targeting EU economic operators\u201d.<\/p>\n
Lange said the final sunset clause was a year later than hoped for, but the end of the deal in May 2029 would coincide with a new presidential administration. He said the parliament would not hesitate to trigger the suspension clause if Trump breached his side of the deal before this date.<\/p>\n
He said the sunset clause was important addition to the deal that would help small and medium-sized businesses as there had been no impact assessment before the deal in Scotland.<\/p>\n
It gives the EU means to address spikes in US imports \u201cthat cause or threaten to cause serious injury to domestic producers\u201d, with suspension again a possible outcome.<\/p>\n
The parliament agreed to scale back some demands, and the final text notably gives the US until the end of the year to reduce its 50% tariff on steel to 15% rather than insisting on it as a precondition.<\/p>\n
Lange played down the concessions extracted from lawmakers, declaring: \u201cParliament has prevailed with its demands for a comprehensive safety net.\u201d<\/p>\n
Anna Cavazzini, of the EU\u2019s Greens, said the deal \u201cputs the EU at a disadvantage\u201d while conceding \u201cit can secure a certain degree of economic stability\u201d. She said: \u201cOne can only hope that the agreement on the tariff deal will now calm the situation, so that other major issues in the EU-US relationship can be addressed.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The EU has finally agreed to implement its trade deal with the US after five hours of talks between members of the European parliament and member states in the hope of averting more tariffs threatened by Donald Trump. It means the agreement struck last July at the US president\u2019s Scottish golf course can now enter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49592,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[2479,696,715,13352,603,111,430,2719],"class_list":{"0":"post-49591","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-agrees","9":"tag-deal","10":"tag-european","11":"tag-implement","12":"tag-struck","13":"tag-summer","14":"tag-trade","15":"tag-union"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=49591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/49592"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=49591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=49591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=49591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}