The European Union may have obtained an pardon at the threat of tariffs of 50% of US president Donald Trump, but it is not yet clear how the block will reconcile its impulse for a mutually beneficial commercial agreement with the demands of Washington of strong concessions.
Trump retracted the imposition of taxes on EU imports from June 1 after a call with the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, restoring the deadline for July 9, in order to allow conversations between the United States and the union of 27 countries to culminate in an agreement.
The European Commission, which supervises the commercial policy of the block, said that the call had given a new boost to the negotiations, that both presidents had agreed to accelerate.
However, there were few indications of what advances, if there were, Trump and von der Leyen had achieved to pave the path to a negotiated solution to the commercial dispute.
The EU is promoting a mutually beneficial agreement that could include the transition to zero tariffs for industrial products by both parties, and the purchase by the EU of more soybeans, weapons and liquefied natural gas as gradually eliminates all imports of Russian gas by the end of 2027.
An official said that the European bloc could even buy more beef without hormones, as the United Kingdom did in a commercial agreement reached with the United States earlier this month.
The European Commission said the call had given a new impulse to the negotiations, that both presidents had agreed to accelerate.
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The European Commission announced Monday that it would firmly defend its tariff offer of “zero by zero”, even in a call scheduled for Monday among the European Commission of Commerce, Maros Sefcovic, and the US Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnick.
“We believe it is a very attractive starting point for a good negotiation that could generate benefits on both banks of the Atlantic,” said a commission spokesman.
The EU also sees cooperation in matters such as excessive steel capacity, of which both parties blame China, and digital technologies such as AI.
The block wants to end the 25% tariffs on steel and cars, and that Trump eliminates its so -called “reciprocal” tariff, which provisionally set at 20% for the union, but which is maintained at 10% during a 90 -day break until July.
Obsession for the commercial deficit of goods
Washington, however, proposes to reduce its commercial deficit of goods with the EU, which amounted to almost 200,000 million euros (228,000 million dollars) last year, although it maintains a considerable commercial surplus, although lower, in the services sector.
It has sent to Brussels a list of demands, in which the so -called non -tariff barriers that you want to address, such as the Value Added Tax, EU food safety standards and national taxes to digital services are identified.
A source from the sector familiar with the negotiations affirmed that Trump wanted a quick agreement with a combination of tangible and symbolic achievements, but that his administration requested much greater concessions than the EU was arranged, or could even, to accept.
Taxes, for example, are the competence of each EU member country, so the commission cannot simply negotiate them.
In some areas, Bernd Lange, president of the Commerce Commission of the European Parliament, who heads a group of legislators in Washington this week, said that the United States saw commercial barriers where they do not exist.
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“It’s about our standards, our chemical regulation and our digital regulation,” he said before his trip. “It’s not about non -tariff barriers. It is not at the negotiating table.”
The EU could analyze specific regulations to determine if they could be excessive, he said, but would not adopt without further ado all American standards, as the White House seemed to demand.
The Trump government has also declared that it wants manufacturing, particularly products such as steel, cars, mobile phones and semiconductors, to move to the United States.
Irish Minister of Agriculture, Martin Heydon, said Monday that the EU was right to boost a mutually beneficial agreement, and Trump’s frustration for the fact that the block had not “given up” was almost a compliment for the position of Europe.
“We are one of the most important commercial partners in the United States. Therefore, we should not accept without any more any requirement of the White House. We should negotiate and explain the mutually beneficial character of trade,” he said.
With reuters infromction
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