Brussels, 23/06/2014 (Agence Europe) - With Geneva to host the seventh round of negotiations for an international trade in services agreement (TISA) this week, the Greens/EFA Group at the European Parliament has expressed alarm at the lack of transparency surrounding the talks and the risks to public services.
The day after Wikileaks leaked texts from the multilateral negotiations underway for an international agreement on the trade in services, German Green Ska Keller, leader of the Greens/EFA Group of Parliament, spoke out on 20 June against the lack of transparency surrounding the talks and the threats of increased liberalisation in services on public service. These leaks “heightened concerns about the potentially far-reaching implications of these opaque talks. It is worrying that the leaks indicate a backroom push to further liberalise the financial services sector: this would show that nothing has been learned from the financial crisis. It is also an affront to current ongoing international efforts to bring the financial sector under control, for example in the G20”, Keller said. “The general direction of these negotiations is clearly worrying, notably the goal of far-reaching service liberalisation. Crucial public services like education, health, water supply, energy and social security appear to be clear targets of these negotiations. Any liberalisation undermining these public services would have dramatic negative consequences for communities and individuals around the world”, she added, arguing for more transparency in the negotiations and for public services to be excluded from the scope of the future TISA agreement.
50 countries of the WTO - Australia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, South Korea, the United States, Hong Kong, Iceland, Israel, Japan, Lichtenstein, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey and the 28 member states of the EU - have been engaged since March 2013 in the talks aiming to get round the deadlock in the Doha round on the liberalisation of trade in services. Together, these countries represent more than two thirds of the global trade in services.
The TISA negotiations cover all of the services sectors, including ICT, logistics services and transport, financial services and business to business services. However, the aim of the future agreement goes beyond simply opening up the services markets: the aim is also to develop new rules on trade in services, such as those applying to public procurement contracts for services, the procedure for granting licences and access to the communication networks. (EH)