Talks 'failed' on divisive EU-US trade agreement

The controversial trade deal between the US and the EU has collapsed, the German economy minister said on Sunday.

After three years of talks, there has been no sign of progress, leaving negotiations effectively dead, according to Sigmar Gabriel who also serves as Germany’s vice-chancellor.

The proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Parnership (TTIP) is geared to create the world’s largest free trade area by easier access in the two enormous economic blocs of the European Union and the United States.

Negotiators from the EU and US had hoped to conclude talks by the end of this year.

But Mr Gabriel has told the world that no agreement has been reached on a single item out of the 27 chapters of the treaty.

 “The talks with the US have de facto failed because we Europeans of course must not succumb to American demands. Nothing is moving forward.”

He said that wrangles between the US and the US, as well as between countries within the EU, appear to have halted the prospect of introducing TTIP, “even though nobody is really admitting it”.

Talks began in 2013 with the aim of reducing or removing a host of barriers to transatlantic trade and investment by means such as eliminating most trade taxes. But the deal has become controversial in both Europe and America.

The UK was firmly behind TTIP, but the Brexit vote has removed the influence it had on the matter.

Opposition to the deal has been increasing in France and Germany, although Chancellor Merkel last month said the arrangement is “absolutely in the EU’s interests”.

French President Hollande is reluctant to open European farming and film markets to more competition from the US. Protestors in Germany have claimed TTIP would undermine labour and environmental standards.

Elsewhere activists say the deal would only benefit multinationals and harm consumers.

President Obama has been a keen supporter of TTIP. Presidential contender Donald Trump has repeatedly spoken against free trade while interest in some such deals from Democratic rival Hillary Clinton appears to have dampened recently.

Proponents of TTIP point out that Mr Gabriel is the leader of a junior partner in Merkel’s coalition government. And the chief negotiator at the European Commission, which is responsible for the negotiations, harkened to Mark Twain’s remark that reports of his death were greatly exaggerated.

There are some indications that negotiations may put talks on hold until the results of elections in the US in November and France and Germany in 2017.

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