EU Calls for Resolving Trade Irritants With US, Cooperating at WTO
The European Union's equivalent of secretary of state is calling for coordination with the U.S. on regulatory conformity, choosing a new director-general at the World Trade Organization and restoring the appellate body there, in a policy paper released Dec. 2. High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell Fontelles said they need to intensify trilateral work between the EU, Japan and the U.S. on how to address market-distorting practices that WTO rules aren't effective in addressing. “We should also work together to bring forward the WTO e-commerce negotiations,” he said.
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He said the U.S. and the EU should cooperate on risk-based assessments of digital supply chain security, and should lead together on 5G infrastructure around the world. “We need closer cooperation on issues such as investment screening, Intellectual Property rights, forced transfers of technology, and export controls,” he wrote. “At the same time, we must also work closely on solving bilateral trade irritants that weaken our strategic partnership. We must work on finding quick solutions by focusing on negotiated outcomes, whilst acknowledging differing approaches. This includes the ongoing efforts to settle the Boeing/Airbus dispute, as well as the lifting of unjustified Section 232 restrictions or other unilateral decisions.”
The EU is looking to enhance coordination on sanctions “while avoiding unintended consequences for European and U.S. economic interests and the unilateral use of extraterritorial sanctions.”
Borrell did not mention the Section 301 investigations for digital taxes, but said the EU and the U.S. should bring discussions on digital taxes in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development to its “timely conclusion.” While most of the paper was either backward looking or focused on current debates, it also called for the EU and the U.S. to work together on creating a global template for carbon import tariffs, so that companies that have higher costs to address greenhouse gas emissions in developed countries aren't undercut by imports from countries with lower ambitions.