On Wednesday 18 April, European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström said she was confident about the possibility of concluding the ongoing negotiations on the trade section of an association agreement between the European Union and Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay), as well as on the trade section of a revised global agreement between the EU and Mexico "this spring".
"We are close (to an agreement in these negotiations). I am still optimistic that they can be finalised this spring", Malmström told press, on the sidelines of the European Parliament's plenary session in Strasbourg.
"Deadlines in trade policy are always a little bit flexible. When you enter the start of the end game, it really becomes complex", she said.
"Mexico is also engaged in renegotiating NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement), which puts pressure on its political and human resources to negotiate two trade agreements at the same time", Malmström explained.
The negotiators from the European Commission and Mexican administration are meeting in Brussels again this week to try and remove the last obstacles to an a agreement (see EUROPE 12002).
Differences of opinion remain on key issues for the EU – like the rules of origin linked to Mexican automobile exports, and the conditions on market access for EU agri-food products (see EUROPE 11966).
The EU and Mexico are staying the course to try and sketch the outlines of a political agreement before the start of the campaign for the Mexican general elections on 1 July.
"We are on the point of making progress, then we will see where we can bring this to the political level", Malmström commented.
Mercosur. As regards Mercosur, "we have made immense progress but we are still not fully there and we need to make sure that we have a high quality agreement that can be accepted by the member states and the European Parliament", Malmström said.
"As always, agriculture is still there to be solved. And there are some other issues related to cars, rules of origin and public procurement where we have made a lot of progress but we are still not there", she added.
Progress was made during the last round of talks in Asunción at the end of February-beginning of March (see EUROPE 11973), but "a bit of work remains to be done", she said.
"The negotiations are not stalled or stuck", Malmström said, adding that she was in close contact at the political level with her counterparts from Mercosur – who will send a team of negotiators to Brussels next week "to look at the issues that are remaining". (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)