This week, World Trade Organization ambassadors met in rue de Lausanne in Geneva for the General Council meeting. It was mainly a meeting to – literally –‘ confront’ views on the state of the organisation and on how to reform it. We partly covered the Appellate Body discussion.
Asia
Week in Brussels: How the EU battery alliance already permeates EU trade policy
On Thursday (2 May) Germany’s Peter Altmaier, France’s Bruno Le Maire and European Commission Vice President Maros Sefcovic formally launched the European Battery Alliance in Paris. The plan has been in the works in Brussels for almost two years and is the new face of European industrial policy. The aim …
Week in Brussels: EU, China, US and the new world (dis-)order, Rules of Origin
As many people in the policy world are taking time off between Easter and the many holidays coming up in May, it’s been a good week to reflect on the state of the world – and of the trading system. We are likely to face very rocky times indeed. For …
Brussels summit: EU and Japan to work on cyber, e-commerce and multilateralism
Japan’s prime minister Shinzo Abe reaffirmed his country’s commitment to multilateralism during a summit with European Union leaders ahead of a visit to Washington on Friday. He is also enlisting the EU in his government’s new digital initiatives. Japan is chairing the G20 this year – and is enrolling Europeans …
Week ahead in EU trade: Japan, WTO disputes
The two main meetings to look for this week in EU trade are an EU-Japan summit and the next meeting of the WTO’s dispute settlement body. Japan’s premier Shinzo Abe will be in Brussels on Thursday (25 April). EU leaders are set to “take stock of the implementation of the …
Week in Brussels: Chile, Cuba, Indonesia
EASTER BREAK: Borderlex journalists also need a break. So we will be off taking a rest for a few days, and back reporting and commenting on European Union trade policy next Tuesday. Happy Easter! What else happened this week in EU trade? EU could challenge new US-Cuba measures at WTO …
Week in Brussels: Russian WTO steel case against EU, procurement reciprocity, Korean labour
China and EU-US trade relations dominated the news this week. Here’s a selection of what else happened. EU to face new Russian WTO complaint over steel anti-dumping duties This week in Geneva, Russia requested a panel in a dispute filed in February 2017 against the EU’s anti-dumping duties on cold-rolled …
Cambodian rice producers sue European Union over rice safeguards
In January 2019, the European Union reintroduced restrictive quotas on imports of rice from Cambodia and Myanmar following a complaint from Italy that these were harming its own rice growers. Cambodian rice farmers won’t just let that pass. So-called Indica rice from the two countries is now subject to a …
China ready to discuss overhaul of WTO subsidy rules
“Negotiations were difficult but ultimately fruitful”, concluded Donald Tusk after Tuesday’s European Union-China summit in Brussels. The two sides achieved their main objective for their meeting, namely to come up with a joint statement that is meaningful enough to EU capital and commits both sides to specific actions. “In today’s …
Week in Brussels: Australia and New Zealand FTAs, Cambodian textiles, US-Japan-EU trilateral
This week was dominated by news on European trade defence policy and by a shift in sentiment in Britain over a customs union with the EU – with ramifications for the Department for International Trade. Other bits of news below. EU-Australia negotiations: third round The EU and Australia held a …
