Brussels/Geneva, 16/07/2001 (Agence Europe) - Given the clear claming of foot and mouth in our countries over the last few months, the European Union called upon its partners from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to ease the restrictions that weigh on its exports and to renounce those still imposed horizontally, all meat products and origins mixed. During the session of the sanitary and phytosanitary measures committee, which took place last week in Geneva, Alejandro Checci Lang, Director for Health from the European Commission, felt that the International Epizootic Office should permit within a few weeks the return to normal of France, Ireland and the Netherlands by declaring these Member States free from the disease. No new cases have been found since last April in France and Ireland (where a few farms were linked to imports from the United Kingdom, where the occurrence of the disease is in free fall), he explained. As for the Netherlands, the European emissary emphasised the effectiveness of the vaccination campaign to stop the spread of the disease. The Union, he said, may understand the emergency measures that have been taken by its trading partners, but today it considers "unacceptable" the restrictions that are imposed upon it be some as an entity and against products, such as poultry, which are not even susceptible of carrying the disease. In his opinion, such measure may be maintained, on condition of following the IEO recommendations and to apply them to risk products and sources.
It to confronted to this disease, Argentina joined the European protests. The Uruguay representative as for him denounced the "unjustified" restrictions against pasteurised products such as UHT milk. The next day, Australia announced a easing of its embargo against European products, while adding that its market would once more be accessible to meat deliveries from Denmark and Austria, the only EU Member States to have answered our strict requirements.