Faced with the lack of a mandate to continue the process of modernising the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT), the European Commission’s services are currently assessing the possibility of withdrawing from the treaty, said Cristina Lobillo Borrero, a member of the Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy (DG ENER), on Monday 5 December.
“We are assessing how to withdraw from the treaty, but we also need to be aware of all the legal issues. So we need to have a very sound analysis before putting a concrete proposal on the table”, said Ms Borrero, during a debate with the European Parliament’s Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE).
She went on to clarify that this assessment is simply intended to provide all the elements necessary for a political decision, but that it is without prejudice to the decision of the College of Commissioners. The EU’s withdrawal would require a proposal from the Commission which would then have to be approved by the EU Council, she stressed.
According to her, the Commission is now “in a very difficult institutional situation”, as the Council was unable to give it a mandate to take part in the vote to adopt the agreement in principle on the modernisation of the ECT (see EUROPE 12979/10).
The Parliament, for its part, adopted a resolution calling for a coordinated exit from the ECT on Thursday 24 November (see EUROPE 13070/14). (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)