Brazil President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has announced to the European Union that his country is planning to withdraw from the European Union Free trade agreement between the EU and the South American confederation Mercosur threatened. If the agreement, which has been negotiated since 1999, is not approved by EU countries in time before the planned signing on Saturday, Brazil will no longer support it, Lula said, according to the Brazilian newspaper Folha de Sao Paolo.
“I have already warned them: if we don’t do it now, Brazil will not make a deal as long as I am president,” said Lula. Brazil waited 26 years for the agreement. The country, with more than 210 million inhabitants and an economic output of around two trillion euros, is the largest economy in the five-country Mercosur group of states.
The negotiations have now been completed, but not yet from the EU The agreement approved would create the world’s largest free trade area, which would include 32 countries with more than 700 million inhabitants and encompass a fifth of the global economy. Within this area, tariffs would then be eliminated on 91 percent of all goods traded between the EU and the Mercosur states. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wants to sign the agreement on Saturday during a visit to Brazil. To do this, however, it needs the approval of the EU Council.
France and Italy are calling for a delay, Merz is demanding approval
The agreement is currently taking place there primarily because of Concerns of France and Italy no majority. Both countries have expressed concerns about domestic agriculture and are calling for the signing deadline to be postponed in order to do more Protective measures for the agricultural sector to decide. Germany, on the other hand, is one of the supporters of the agreement. Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) wants to convince the skeptics to agree to the agreement at the EU summit of heads of state and government in Brussels on Thursday and Friday, as government spokesman Stefan Kornelius announced.
In a government statement in the Bundestag, Merz harshly criticized France and Italy: Anyone in the EU who is preventing major trade agreements has “still not properly understood the priorities that we have to set now,” said the Chancellor. Given the geopolitical and economic situation, there should be no “quarreling” with the agreement. It’s not just about EU-Mercosur trade itself, but also about the “ability of the European Union to act”.
