The Belgium Parliament is in an emergency session over a collapsed Trade
Agreement between the EU and Canada.
The agreement, called CETA was five years in the making and has spent
another 2 years seeking EU ratification. It is held up because a portion of
Belgium will not go along.
EU leaders warned that critical discussions in Brussels on Friday could
determine the fate of Europe’s trade policy as they stepped up frantic
efforts to persuade a regional parliament in Belgium to lift its veto on a
deal with Canada.
Charles Michel, Belgium’s prime minister, said he was “not reassured” by
emergency talks overnight with the leaders of his country’s Walloon region
and Justin Trudeau, his Canadian counterpart.
Arriving at the second day of an EU summit in Brussels, Mr Michel said
talks in the pre-dawn hours had left him “feeling that there is a
radicalisation in the position of the Wallonian parliament”.
The stalled Canadian deal, known as Ceta, was supposed to set new
standards for global trade. But its increasing risk of collapse, because
Belgium cannot sign the treaty without regional support, threatens to sink EU
trade policy by calling into question the bloc’s capacity to conclude future
agreements with other partners.
The impasse over Ceta has propelled the concerns of Wallonia, a region of
Belgium with a population of about 3.5m people, to the top of Europe’s
political agenda. Incessant Belgian wrangling over the agreement, which is
due to be formally signed at ceremonies with Canada next week, overshadowed a
regular two-day meeting of EU leaders that began on Thursday evening in Brussels.
The turmoil over Ceta has damaged the EU’s credibility as a trade
negotiator. The agreement is supported by the governments of all 28 member
states, including that of Belgium, which cannot sign without Wallonia’s
blessing. MPs in the local parliament have passed a succession of votes
against the pact in light of concerns about globalisation, new trade courts,
social rights and environmental regulation.
The EU and Canada struck the Ceta deal two years ago, after five years of
negotiations. Days before the pact is to due be signed, Mr Magnette is
engaged in direct talks with Chrystia Freeland, Canadian trade minister.
The parliament was sitting in emergency session on Friday morning after
Paul Magnette, chief of the regional government, rejected a new document
clarifying the most contentious terms of the Ceta late on Thursday night.
Other EU leaders have so far sought to keep their frustration with the
impasse in check, but it is not clear if that patience will hold should
Wallonia continue to block the deal.
“At this stage, for us, the document is not sufficient,” Mr Magnette told
reporters on Thursday night. “We’ll see how we can modify the text that we
were given.”
The battle to rescue Ceta has raised questions about Europe’s capacity to
conclude any new trade deals. As the EU summit began on Thursday, European
Council president Donald Tusk said Ceta “could be our last free-trade
agreement” if the deal founders.
Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission, said Ceta was
the EU’s “best” trade deal. “If we will be unable to conclude a trade
arrangement with Canada, I don’t see how it would be possible to have trade
agreements with other parts of this world.”
Elio Di Rupo, the Belgian Socialist leader, is being cast as the man who
could scupper European trade policy as Brussels struggles to salvage a trade
pact with Canada that was supposed to set a benchmark for the world.
Trade officials see the bow-tied Mr Di Rupo, who was prime minister of
Belgium between 2011 and 2014, as the driving force behind regional
resistance to the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement that threatens
to pull it apart.
Mr Di Rupo’s Socialist party holds sway in the restive parliament of the
French-speaking Walloon region, whose blessing is required for Belgium’s
pro-trade government to sign Ceta. Another Walloon vote against the pact came
on Friday despite frantic political efforts to appease the objectors. An
attempt to break the logjam will resume this week.
The deal’s supporters have Mr Di Rupo firmly in their sights, drawing
caustic comparisons with the Franco-Belgian cartoon character Asterix, a
tireless warrior against Roman overlords. “It’s like he’s defending the last
Gaullist village against the onset of the Roman empire,” said a senior trade
official.
This is precisely what happens when all 27 nations have to agree to a
deal. In this case, a portion of one nation will not go along.
Such madness is yet another example why the UK is better off outside of
the EU.