The EU and the Andean Community agreed on Saturday on a framework for an agreement that would knock down some commercial barriers — despite deep disagreements on free trade within the South American bloc's members.
Peruvian President Alan Garcia said leaders will hold a fourth and final round of talks on June 12 on the deal between the Andean Community and its largest commercial partner after the US. Details were not released.
The preliminary agreement was reached a day after European, Latin American and Caribbean leaders pledged to fight poverty, global warming and high food prices in a biennial summit.
Participants in the main summit said in a declaration late on Friday that the deal will take into account disagreements both between and within the two regions. Andean community member nations Peru and Colombia both favor more open commerce, while Ecuador and Bolivia oppose free trade deals.
Those disagreements showed earlier this week as Bolivian President Evo Morales accused Peru, which has the fastest-growing economy in the bloc, of trying to negotiate a trade deal on its own.
Peru denied the accusation, calling it “unjust.”
“We want trade,” Morales said in a statement, “but fair trade that allows us to find an equilibrium between continents.”
He urged negotiators not to sideline Bolivia from talks simply because it’s more cautious about eliminating trade barriers.
Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa said the agreement seeks to resolve the differences.
“I think negotiation as a bloc can be achieved within the Andean Community despite the differences,” he said in his weekly radio address. “The proposed strategy is a flexible framework in which the countries can adhere to certain parts of the agreement, but not others” that they don’t like.
Both Morales and Correa have vowed not to sign free-trade agreements with the US, as Colombia and Peru have done.
The two presidents have repeatedly said they don’t want the EU trade pact to look like deals the US has with various Latin American countries.
Morales and Correa also want the EU to ease restrictions on Andean immigration to Europe.
Trade between the EU and the Andean Community reached US$16.6 billion in 2006, up from US$7.6 billion in 2000, the South American bloc said.
CHIPMAKING INVESTMENT: J.W. Kuo told legislators that Department of Investment Review approval would be needed were Washington to seek a TSMC board seat Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) yesterday said he received information about a possible US government investment in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and an assessment of the possible effect on the firm requires further discussion. If the US were to invest in TSMC, the plan would need to be reviewed by the Department of Investment Review, Kuo told reporters ahead of a hearing of the legislature’s Economics Committee. Kuo’s remarks came after US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Tuesday said that the US government is looking into the federal government taking equity stakes in computer chip manufacturers that
POWER PLANT POLL: The TPP said the number of ‘yes’ votes showed that the energy policy should be corrected, and the KMT said the result was a win for the people’s voice The government does not rule out advanced nuclear energy generation if it meets the government’s three prerequisites, President William Lai (賴清德) said last night after the number of votes in favor of restarting a nuclear power plant outnumbered the “no” votes in a referendum yesterday. The referendum failed to pass, despite getting more “yes” votes, as the Referendum Act (公民投票法) states that the vote would only pass if the votes in favor account for more than one-fourth of the total number of eligible voters and outnumber the opposing votes. Yesterday’s referendum question was: “Do you agree that the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have declared they survived recall votes to remove them from office today, although official results are still pending as the vote counting continues. Although final tallies from the Central Election Commission (CEC) are still pending, preliminary results indicate that the recall campaigns against all seven KMT lawmakers have fallen short. As of 6:10 pm, Taichung Legislators Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), Hsinchu County Legislator Lin Szu-ming (林思銘), Nantou County Legislator Ma Wen-chun (馬文君) and New Taipei City Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) had all announced they
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) yesterday visited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), as the chipmaker prepares for volume production of Nvidia’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) chips. It was Huang’s third trip to Taiwan this year, indicating that Nvidia’s supply chain is deeply connected to Taiwan. Its partners also include packager Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密) and server makers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and Quanta Computer Inc (廣達). “My main purpose is to visit TSMC,” Huang said yesterday. “As you know, we have next-generation architecture called Rubin. Rubin is very advanced. We have now taped out six brand new
RSS