On Monday 24 October, the president of the European Council, Donald Tusk, and the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, decided in the late afternoon to allow more time to enable Belgium to agree to sign the EU-Canada free-trade deal (CETA). They also decided to keep the EU-Canada summit that was planned in Brussels for 27 October, hoping that CETA can be signed there.
Tusk tweeted shortly before 7.00pm after a telephone conversation with Trudeau that they thought the summit was still possible and encouraged all sides to find a solution as there was still time for one.
In the middle of the afternoon, after a meeting with representatives of the Belgian federal bodies, the Belgian prime minister, Charles Michel, told Tusk (who had given Belgium an ultimatum the day before to make its position clear) that the Belgian federal government was not able to endorse signature of CETA because three of its seven federal bodies (the Walloon region, Brussels-Capital region and the Wallonia-Brussels federation) were refusing to give it full powers.
The minister-president of the Wallonia region, Socialist Paul Magnette, said it was clear that in the current circumstances, a ‘yes’ cannot be given today, adding that his region did not reject CETA en bloc, but wanted guarantees about protection of public services and the lack of private arbitration mechanisms.
Magnette said they did not want private arbitration that would allow multinationals to attack countries, and they did not want this to attack social and environmental standards and protection of public services.
Magnette said each time people tried to impose ultimatums, it just made calm discussions impossible and made democratic debate impossible.
In the middle of the morning, the European Commission was flexible, saying it was prepared to leave Belgium a few more weeks, and that patience was currently needed. European Commission spokesperson Margaritis Schinas said the Commission was not in the habit of working with ultimatums and deadlines. (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)