Brussels, 21/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President José Manuel Barroso, meeting President of the Swiss Confederation Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf on Tuesday, expressed their desire for relations between the EU and Switzerland to go beyond the bilateral sectoral agreements signed up until now. “The approach hitherto, based on standard international agreements in specific sectors, has gone as far as it can”, said Van Rompuy. He argued for “a more comprehensive, more stable framework for cooperation to ensure the proper operation of those parts of the EU internal market in which Switzerland is engaged”. Barroso said: “It is essential to move forward particularly with regard to the overall institutional approach on Swiss participation in key areas of our internal market and taxation of savings”. He offered four principles for the future of EU-Swiss relations: “enthusiastic adoption of the 'acquis communautaire', its uniform interpretation”, formulation of “oversight options and judicial supervision of commitments”. He awaits a “clear, unequivocal signal” on these key principles from the Swiss authorities. “An unambiguous political agreement on these basic issues would allow negotiations to be concluded on certain matters”, including energy, he suggested.
Widmer-Schlumpf said that her government would bring forward “concrete proposals” on the institutional issues in the coming weeks. She acknowledged that little progress had been made on market access.
Taxation of savings. On the thorny matter of the so-called Rubik bilateral agreements on taxation of savings which Switzerland has signed with Germany and with the United Kingdom, Barroso warned: “The Commission will never accept a bilateral agreement between a member state and a third country, such as Switzerland, unless it complies fully with Community law.”
The European perspective of Western Balkans countries was an issue also broached. Van Rompuy said he was pleased that Switzerland was involved in EU missions, such as EULEX in Kosovo. On Wednesday 21 March, Widmer-Schlumpf took part in the official ceremony in Belgium one week after the road accident in Switzerland which claimed the lives of so many Belgian and Dutch children. (MB/transl.rt)