Latest news with #EU officials
Japan Times
2 days ago
- Business
- Japan Times
Out-gunned Europe accepts least-worst U.S. trade deal
In the end, Europe found it lacked the leverage to pull Donald Trump's America into a trade pact on its terms and so has signed up to a deal it can just about stomach — albeit one that is clearly skewed in the U.S.'s favor. As such, Sunday's agreement on a blanket 15% tariff after a monthslong standoff is a reality check on the aspirations of the 27-country European Union to become an economic power able to stand up to the likes of the United States or China. The cold shower is all the more bracing given that the EU has long portrayed itself as an export superpower and champion of rules-based commerce for the benefit both of its own soft power and the global economy as a whole. For sure, the new tariff that will now be applied is a lot more digestible than the 30% "reciprocal" tariff that Trump threatened to invoke in a few days. While it should ensure Europe avoids recession, it will likely keep its economy in the doldrums: it sits somewhere between two tariff scenarios the European Central Bank last month forecast would mean 0.5-0.9% economic growth this year compared with just over 1% in a trade tension-free environment. But this is nonetheless a landing point that would have been scarcely imaginable only months ago in the pre-Trump 2.0 era, when the EU along with much of the world could count on U.S. tariffs averaging out at around 1.5%. Even when Britain agreed a baseline tariff of 10% with the United States back in May, EU officials were adamant they could do better and — convinced the bloc had the economic heft to square up to Trump — pushed for a "zero-for-zero" tariff pact. It took a few weeks of fruitless talks with their U.S. counterparts for the Europeans to accept that 10% was the best they could get and a few weeks more to take the same 15% baseline that the United States agreed with Japan last week. "The EU does not have more leverage than the U.S., and the Trump administration is not rushing things," said one senior official in a European capital who was being briefed on last week's negotiations as they closed in around the 15% level. That official and others pointed to the pressure from Europe's export-oriented businesses to clinch a deal and so ease the levels of uncertainty starting to hit businesses from Finland's Nokia to Swedish steelmaker SSAB. "We were dealt a bad hand. This deal is the best possible play under the circumstances," said one EU diplomat. "Recent months have clearly shown how damaging uncertainty in global trade is for European businesses." That imbalance — or what the trade negotiators have been calling "asymmetry" — is manifest in the final deal. Not only is it expected that the EU will now call off any retaliation and remain open to U.S. goods on existing terms, but it has also pledged $600 billion of investment in the United States. The time frame for that remains undefined, as do other details of the accord for now. As talks unfolded, it became clear that the EU came to the conclusion it had more to lose from all-out confrontation. The retaliatory measures it threatened totaled some €93 billion ($109 billion) — less than half its U.S. goods trade surplus of nearly €200 billion. True, a growing number of EU capitals were also ready to envisage wide-ranging anti-coercion measures that would have allowed the bloc to target the services trade in which the United States had a surplus of some $75 billion last year. But even then, there was no clear majority for targeting the U.S. digital services that European citizens enjoy and for which there are scant homegrown alternatives — from Netflix to Uber to Microsoft cloud services. It remains to be seen whether this will encourage European leaders to accelerate the economic reforms and diversification of trading allies to which they have long paid lip service but which have been held back by national divisions. Describing the deal as a painful compromise that was an "existential threat" for many of its members, Germany's BGA wholesale and export association said it was time for Europe to reduce its reliance on its biggest trading partner. "Let's look on the past months as a wake-up call," said BGA President Dirk Jandura. "Europe must now prepare itself strategically for the future — we need new trade deals with the biggest industrial powers of the world."
France 24
18-07-2025
- Business
- France 24
Congress approves Trump's $9 billion cut to public broadcasting and foreign aid
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Globe and Mail
15-07-2025
- Politics
- Globe and Mail
EU ministers request more detail and action from Israel on aid deal for Gaza
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union is seeking updates — and more action — from Israel on implementing a new deal to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, the bloc's foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Tuesday. Foreign ministers from the EU's 27 member nations were meeting in Brussels in the wake of the deal largely forged by Kallas and Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar. Saar met with EU leaders on Monday after agreeing last week to allow desperately needed food and fuel into the coastal enclave of 2.3 million people who have endured more than 21 months of war. 'The border crossings have been opened, we see more trucks going in, we see also operations of the electricity network, but it's clearly not enough because the situation is still untenable,' Kallas said. Details of the deal remain unclear, but EU officials have rejected any cooperation with the Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Fund over ethical and safety concerns. Opening more border crossings and allowing more aid trucks into Gaza is the priority, but officials say eventually they'd like to set up a monitoring station at Kerem Shalom crossing. Calls to reassess ties with Israel European nations like Ireland, the Netherlands and Spain have increasingly called for the EU's ties with Israel to be reassessed in the wake of the war. A report by the European Commission found 'indications' that Israel's actions in Gaza are violating human rights obligations in the agreement governing its ties with the EU, but the bloc is divided over how to respond. Public pressure over Israel's conduct in Gaza made the new humanitarian deal possible, Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp said, adding: 'That force of the 27 EU member states is what I want to maintain now." Kallas will update EU member nations every two weeks on how much aid is actually getting through to desperate Gazans, Irish Foreign Minister Thomas Byrne said. 'So far we haven't really seen the implementation of it, maybe some very small actions, but there's still slaughter going on, there's still a denial of access to food and water as well," he said. 'We need to see action.' Spanish Foreign Minister José Manual Albares Bueno said details of the deal were still being discussed and the EU would monitor results to see if Israel is complying. 'It's very clear that this agreement is not the end — we have to stop the war," he said. There have been regular protests across the continent, including a small one on Tuesday outside the European Council, where the ministers were discussing the aid plan. Dozens of protesters in Brussels called for more aggressive actions to stop Israel's military campaign in Gaza. 'It was able to do this for Russia," said Alexis Deswaef, vice president of the International Federation for Human Rights. "It must now agree on a package of sanctions for Israel to end the genocide and for humanitarian aid to enter Gaza.' Human rights groups largely called the EU's actions insufficient. 'This is more than political cowardice," said Agnès Callamard, secretary general of Amnesty International. 'Every time the EU fails to act, the risk of complicity in Israel's actions grows. This sends an extremely dangerous message to perpetrators of atrocity crimes that they will not only go unpunished but be rewarded.' Risks to humanitarian groups The war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage, most of whom have been released in earlier ceasefires. Israel responded with an offensive that has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. The ministry, which is under Gaza's Hamas-run government, doesn't differentiate between civilians and combatants. The U.N. and other international organizations see its figures as the most reliable statistics on war casualties. The EU has observed some aid trucks entering Gaza, but 'not enough,' said Hajda Lahbib, an EU commissioner for equality, preparedness and crisis management. 'The situation is still so dangerous, so violent, with strikes still continuing on the ground, that our humanitarian partners cannot operate. So, this is the reality — we need to have a ceasefire," she said.
