The Commission has started their public consultation on investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) as announced earlier. We are, however, dissapointed that there is no question whether ISDS should be excluded from TTIP. Anyway, a positive aspect is that concrete text proposals were published. These correspond to the text of the planned…

Investor-state dispute settlement ( ISDS ) has come into the focus of critics since the start of negotiations on a free trade agreement with the US (TTIP). ISDS means that foreign investors can sue the states hosting their investments in front of international courts when they see their rights and…

Public consultation on ISDS in TTIP started – participate and show rejection of ISDS As previously announced the Commission has launched its consultation on Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) in the trade agreement with the United States (TTIP). We are disappointed that there is no question about whether ISDS should be…

TTIP website of the Greens/EFA group online The Greens/EFA group in the European Parliament has set up a new web site on TTIP. There you can find campaign videos, up-to-date information and much useful background material. http://ttip2014.eu/   Two LSE studies about ISDS There are two new studies of the…

The Free Trade Agreement with the USA (TTIP)  After the public pressure of the last months, the Commission has relented at least partly on the highly dangerous Investor-State-Dispute-Settlement (ISDS) mechanism. There will be a three month open consultation starting in March on the basis of a preliminary draft of the…

Parliament Resolution on the General System of Preferences (GSP) In January 2014, the new GSP-regulation will become operative. The GSP allows preferred access for the products of developing countries to the EU-Market. Within the scope of the new competences through the Lisbon Treaty the Parliament has now the opportunity to…

TTIP The second negotiating round, which was postponed due to the US-American shutdown, is taking place this week (11 – 15 November). Market access (especially investment and services), tariffs as well as energy and raw materials are on the agenda. The third negotiating round will take place in December as…

Based on the Commission’s papers on the EU’s negotiating position. Some of them are publicly available, to be found under: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=943   Horizontal regulatory cooperation What the EU wants The EU aims at completely abolishing, or at least reducing, “unnecessary” safeguards that hinder trade and investment. A kind of transatlantic…

Hearing on EU-US free trade agreement in the European Parliament The second negotiation round, which was planned for 7-11 October in Brussels, has been cancelled due to the US budget dispute. On 14 October a hearing on the TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) took place in the committee on…

Fires in factories in Bangladesh In the Trade Committee the Bangladeshi ambassador reported on progress with social standards and the factories’ security. The responsible for the factories, in which the fires occurred, have been arrested. 200 additional inspectors are made available for security checks in the factories. The ambassador lauded…