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The European Union and the United States are expected to commit at a summit in Brussels next week to end their transatlantic trade disputes and to call for a new study on the origins of COVID-19, according to a draft statement .
The seven-page draft, seen by Reuters, aims to show the concrete results of the “new dawn” hailed by European leaders when US President Joe Biden took over from Donald Trump in January.
The project, which was discussed by EU ambassadors on Wednesday, pledges to end a long-standing dispute over subsidies to aircraft manufacturers by July 11 and lift imposed steel tariffs three years ago by December.
Despite pressure from US steel industry groups to maintain Trump’s “Section 232” national security tariffs, the bill states, “We pledge to work towards lifting by December 1, 2021 all the additional / punitive tariffs on both sides related to our steel and dispute. “
Biden will meet with European Union Director General Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel, who represents EU governments, and will also pledge to promote international cooperation to fight global warming . Read more
The EU and the US are the world’s main trading powers, along with China, but Trump has sought to sideline the EU.
After concluding a free trade agreement with the EU, the Trump administration has focused on reducing the growing US deficit in merchandise trade. Biden, however, sees the EU as an ally in promoting free trade, as well as in the fight against climate change and the end of the COVID-19 pandemic.
COVID ORIGINS
At the Brussels summit, the two sides will agree to cooperate on Chinese policy and will also call for a new study on the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan, according to the project. Read more
The two sides also pledge an effort to help immunize at least two-thirds of the world’s population against COVID-19 by the end of 2022 and to reduce vaccine export restrictions. Read more .
“We call for progress on a transparent, evidence-based study (…) on the origins of COVID-19, without interference,” the project says.
The two dominant theories are that the virus passed from animals, perhaps bats, to humans, or that it escaped from a virology lab in Wuhan. Members of a WHO team that traveled to China this year to investigate the origin of COVID-19 said they had not had access to all the data, fueling the debate.
If accepted, the common position on China will be a boost for the Biden administration, which is seeking friends to stand up to Beijing but has said it will not force any ally to choose sides.
EU states have so far tried to maintain a strategic balance that avoids alienating either China or the United States.
But China’s military expansion, its claims of sovereignty over most of the South China Sea, and the massive detentions of Uyghur Muslims in northwest China have changed the mood in Brussels.
“We intend to consult and cooperate closely on all issues under our respective China-like multifaceted approaches, which include elements of cooperation, competition and systemic rivalry,” said the project.
Our Standards: Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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