2023-09-15 02:00:17
© Reuters
BRASILIA (Reuters) -The Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported on Thursday that Mercosur sent the European Union the day before its response to the additional letter sent by the European bloc to South American countries within the scope of negotiations for a free trade agreement and negotiators Both sides discussed the next steps.
“Mercosur’s response to the EU was sent last night. Today there is a video conference between Mercosur and the EU to advance the discussion, which has been the subject of frequent meetings between negotiators,” said the Itamaraty press office.
Later, the European Commission confirmed the video conference would take place.
“Today we also received a document from Mercosur that we will use as a basis for a new commitment”, declared the Commission in a statement, adding that the talks aim to conclude negotiations before the end of the year.
The trade agreement was reached in 2019, after two decades of negotiations, but remains on hold due to environmental concerns.
The additional letter sent by the Europeans, with demands on Mercosur in this area, has already been classified as “unacceptable” by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who states that the document contains threats of sanctions against Brazil and that it cannot, in a dialogue between partners, there are threats.
Brazil currently holds the temporary presidency of Mercosur and Lula has repeated his intention to conclude the trade agreement with the European Union by the end of this year.
A source at Paraguay’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Reuters that the Mercosur countries — made up of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay — apparently agreed with the EU’s response, overcoming the bloc’s internal tensions that had delayed sending the response.
“There is general agreement with Brazil not to accept terms that harm the development of Mercosur nations,” said this source.
In a press conference this week in New Delhi, India, where he participated in the G20 summit, Lula defended a summit between the leaders of Mercosur and the EU so that there can be a definition of the future of the agreement.
Lula also said that, if the trade pact is not concluded in the coming months, it is necessary to decide whether or not both parties want the agreement and, if not, stop discussing it.
At the press conference in the Indian capital, Lula also repeated Brazil’s opposition to the opening of the government procurement sector, arguing once again that these acquisitions are part of the countries’ industrial policies.
Also this week, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said during a State of the Union speech at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France, that the bloc wants to conclude the agreement with Mercosur, which would be the largest ever signed by the EU in population terms by the end of this year.
However, internal divisions in the South American bloc have reduced expectations that a trade pact will be reached in 2023 and factors such as the election for the European Parliament next year and the presidential election in Argentina this year could further complicate the situation. scenario.
EU negotiators had been awaiting Mercosur’s response to the additional letter since March. Many expected the agreement to be quickly concluded under the Lula government, which has changed the country’s environmental policy to increase protection of the Amazon rainforest since taking office in January.
(Reporting by Anthony Boadle, in Brasília, Philip Blenkinsop, in Brussels, Lucinda Elliott, in Montevideo, and Daniela Desantis, in Asunción; Text by Eduardo Simões; Editing by Isabel Versiani and Alexandre Caverni)
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