(Jan 16): The European Parliament is considering linking approval of a massive US trade deal to Donald Trump backing down from his threats to take over Greenland, putting further strain on an agreement already facing opposition.
“It is clear that national sovereignty of any country needs to be respected by all partners of the trade deal,” said Bernd Lange, the long-time chair of Parliament’s trade committee who is helping oversee the discussion, in an interview with Bloomberg.
EU lawmakers are on the cusp of finalising the trade pact, which the US president struck with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last summer. While the agreement has already been partially implemented, it still needs Parliament’s approval to become official.
That process is now being swept into Europe’s standoff with Trump over Greenland, the semi-autonomous Danish territory suddenly at the centre of US-EU relations. The dispute has created a push within Parliament to delay a planned late-January vote on the two sides’ trade pact.
Any significant pause risks worsening an already delicate transatlantic trade relationship, although Europeans are also warning that Trump’s sabre rattling toward Greenland is endangering western allies’ entire security alliance.
Lawmakers will meet on Wednesday to discuss deferring their trade vote, with political groups split over what to do, according to officials familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Groups on the right, including the powerful centre-right European People’s Party, are broadly in favour of pushing ahead as planned. Groups on the left generally want to slow things down.
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“There are several elements that we are saying we need more clarity,” said Lange, a German MEP with the centre-left Social Democratic Party. “We will look at different elements and then decide next week.”
Parliament has been in wait-and-see mode for days over the issue. Members of Lange’s trade committee met on Wednesday for an initial discussion about tying Greenland’s sovereignty to the US trade deal. But they decided to reconvene in a week, given that Danish and Greenlandic officials were still in Washington trying to temper the Trump administration.
That didn’t work, leaving the next steps unclear.
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“Nobody knows what will happen in the next days,” Lange said.
The EU-US trade agreement set a 15% tariff for most EU goods in exchange for a pledge by Brussels to eliminate duties on US industrial goods and some agricultural products. Von der Leyen, who oversees trade negotiations for the EU, made the deal in the hopes of avoiding a full-blown trade war with Trump.
A vocal faction of EU lawmakers have long railed against the agreement, arguing it was too lopsided in favour of the US. That anger has deepened as the US expanded a 50% tariff on steel and aluminium to hundreds of additional EU products after the July accord.
Trump’s Greenland threats are now giving those critics more ammunition.
Per Clausen, a Danish MEP with The Left group, gathered 30 signatures for a letter sent Wednesday to Parliament leaders urging them to “freeze” the trade deal “as long as claims for Greenland and threats are made by the US administration”.
“It would seem extremely strange if we were to enter into an agreement with the US now,” Clausen said in an interview. “This would be a clear signal that, from the EU’s side, we are prepared to use the instruments we now have vis-a-vis the US if they continue their aggression.”
The Danish government is staying away from the debate, and has not supported any efforts to stall the trade deal, an EU diplomat said.
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There are other steps the US can take to help ensure the pact is adopted, Lange said, pointing to the expanded 50% tariff rate. If those duties are lowered to 15%, Lange said, that would be “a strong argument” for Parliament to proceed with the planned vote.
Lange added that he expected Washington to move on this issue, but didn’t provide any specific details.
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