Brussels, 28/06/2012 (Agence Europe) - The Commission will ask the Council next week for a mandate to open negotiations for a free-trade agreement with Japan. The Japanese authorities, for their part, have still not given the EU a date for the annual EU-Japan summit.
The staff of Commissioner for Trade Karel De Gucht will submit a request next week for authorisation to negotiate a free-trade agreement with Japan. De Gucht announced the end of the scoping exercise on 31 May.
The group of Liberals and Democrats at the European Parliament spoke out on Thursday 28 June to deplore the fact that no date had been arranged for the 2012 annual EU-Japan summit before the summer, when it is usually held in May. “The reluctance of member states to open negotiations for a free trade agreement is at the origin of this cancellation. It is also regrettable that the majority of Parliament has shown the same reluctance”, regrets Bulgarian MEP Metin Kazak in the name of the ALDE Group.
Over at the Council, several member states led by Germany and France are demanding more commitment from Japan, in particular as regards non-tariff barriers and public procurement, before they go any further. The Parliament adopted a resolution on 13 June indicating that it did not want the Council to authorise the opening of trade negotiations with Japan before deciding on its position on the negotiating mandate for the Commission. At a debate with De Gucht on 12 June, a large number of MEPs had said that they doubted Japan's will to remove its non-tariff barriers, to improve access to Japanese public procurement and to improve access to the Japanese pharmaceutical and automobile markets. In 2011, the Parliament had asked for a roadmap on the lifting of Japanese non-tariff obstacles.
As a sign of their probable annoyance at Europe's prevarication, the Japanese authorities, who will host the annual 2012 summit, have still not proposed a date to the EU authorities. The summit has not been cancelled but postponed indefinitely, the Council intimates.
At the Parliament, the ALDE Group, which did not support the resolution of 13 June, is “confident that the launch of negotiations in itself sends a positive signal during this downturn in the global economy”. The Liberals also say that they hope the reticence of the Council does not augur a similar position with regard to the launch of free-trade negotiations with the United States. (EH/transl.fl)