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TRADE WARS
EU-Canada trade summit 'still possible' despite holdout Belgium
By Lachlan CARMICHAEL, Bryan McManus
Brussels (AFP) Oct 24, 2016


US slaps steep duties on Canadian, Chinese machine parts
Washington (AFP) Oct 24, 2016 - The US Commerce Department Monday said it would begin imposing steep tariffs on certain Chinese and Canadian mechanical parts dumped on the US market at below cost.

The department said that iron transfer drive components -- machinery parts like pulleys, sheaves and flywheels -- from Canadian and Chinese companies were sold on the US market at a fraction of the real price.

One Canadian Company, Baldor Electric, failed to answer Commerce Department requests for information and department investigators assessed dumping margins of 191.7 percent on the company's products. For other Canadian producers, a blanket tariff of 100.5 percent was assessed.

For Chinese imports, dumping margins of 13.6-401.7 percent were assessed on all suppliers. The Commerce Department also said that certain products had benefited from unfair subsidies, and assigned a countervailing tariffs of 33.3-163.5 percent.

In 2014, imports of the mechanical parts in the case from Canada and China had been valued at $222.3 million and $274.3 million, respectively.

The US International Trade Commission is to make a final ruling on the tariffs in December. If the commission overrules the Commerce Department decision, duties collected will be refunded.

A Brussels summit to seal a landmark EU-Canada trade deal is "still possible" this week, European Council President Donald Tusk said Monday, even though Belgium cannot give its approval.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier appeared unlikely to attend Thursday's summit after the Belgian government said regional leaders were preventing it from supporting the pact, effectively blocking the 28-nation bloc.

But Tusk said after a telephone call with Trudeau late Monday that the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) could still be salvaged.

"Together with PM Justin Trudeau, we think Thursday's summit still possible. We encourage all parties to find a solution. There's yet time," Tusk tweeted.

He did not say whether Thursday's summit would involve signing the accord or involve more negotiations on a deal which took seven years to nail down and another two years to get to the final approval stage.

Belgian Premier Charles Michel said his government could not endorse the deal after brief talks in Brussels failed to win over the leaders of Wallonia and other French-speaking regions.

"We are not in a position to sign CETA," said Michel who pointed out that the federal government, the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders and the German-speaking community all supported the agreement.

To go ahead, all 28 EU member states, including Belgium, must endorse the pact that would link the EU's single market of 500 million people -- the world's biggest -- with the 10th largest global economy.

The European Commission, the EU executive, also said earlier there was still time to conclude the agreement despite fears in some quarters it was now close to collapse.

Leaders of Wallonia, a 3.5 million-strong French-speaking region south of the capital Brussels, want more talks to produce cast-iron reassurances that CETA will not harm local interests.

- Wallonia rejects 'ultimatum' -

Wallonia leader Paul Magnette said as he left the talks with Michel that he could not endorse the accord under what he called the pressure of an ultimatum after Tusk had called for an answer by late Monday.

"It is evident that in the current circumstances, we cannot give a 'yes' today," he said.

Magnette and other critics criticise terms of the deal intended to protect international investors which, they say, could allow them to force governments to change laws against the wishes of the people.

CETA is opposed by anti-globalisation groups who say it is a test model to push through an even more controversial EU-US trade deal called TTIP, on which talks have also stalled.

Wallonia has support around Europe and from non-government organisations like Greenpeace, which fears the deal will reward "corporate greed" at the expense of hard-won EU health and environmental standards.

Apart from sowing tensions with the European Council and the European Commission which strongly support the deal, Wallonia's position highlights long-standing divisions in Belgium between the northern and wealthier Flemish-speaking region of Flanders, which backs CETA and sees its southern, French-speaking left-leaning compatriots as wasteful spendthrifts.

It also delivers a fresh blow to the EU, still in shock after the June Brexit vote and trying to cope with its worst migration crisis since World War II -- alongside a faltering economy.

Canada has made no secret of its anger with Belgium and the EU after talks last week with Magnette ended frustratingly for Chrystia Freeland, its trade minister.

She ended up walking out of the meeting, saying she could go no further and blasting the EU as being "incapable" of signing international agreements.

- CETA 'de facto dead' -

Businesses back CETA as a guarantee of much-needed jobs and growth in the EU, as well as a testament to its trustworthiness as an actor on the international stage.

"We still can and we have the duty to urgently bring home the best trade agreement the EU has ever negotiated," BusinessEurope lobby group head Emma Marcegaglia said in a statement.

Bernd Lange, chairman of the International Trade Committee of the European Parliament and fervent CETA supporter, doubted the Belgians would move much further if they had been unable to do so under the current pressure.

"CETA is de facto dead. Possibly there will be another try to sign it in a few weeks but I am not persuaded that this will succeed," Lange said.

bur-lc/bmm/gw

RTL GROUP


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Previous Report
TRADE WARS
Canada-EU failure signals more bad news for free trade deals
Washington (AFP) Oct 23, 2016
The collapse of free trade talks between Canada and the European Union Friday is yet another sign of increasingly stiff resistance to economic globalization. Despite seven years of talks between Ottawa and Brussels, the CETA Treaty crashed into a wall Friday after being rejected by the Belgian region of Wallonia, making it impossible for the European Union to approve the deal. That was a ... read more


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