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The WTO's negotiating function: Towards plurilaterals and new trade challenges
A key function of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is to serve for its members as a forum for the negotiation of global trade rules. However, since the WTO's foundation in 1995, WTO members have largely failed to meet their self-defined negotiating objectives as set out in the comprehensive 2001 Doha Development Agenda (DDA). By the time of the 2024 Abu Dhabi Ministerial Conference, WTO members had settled on merely two multilateral agreements in almost 30 years: a 2013 agreement on trade facilitation ...
President Biden's 2024 State of the Union address
On 7 March 2024, the President of the United States (US), Joe Biden, used his State of the Union (SOTU) address to a joint session of the 118th US Congress (2023 2024) to start his re election campaign in earnest. Biden has been trailing Donald Trump, his only remaining Republican challenger in the presidential race, in polls in six swing states that Biden won in 2020 and where several thousand voters are expected to decide the outcome of the US elections on 5 November 2024. The SOTU was an opportunity ...
EU-Taiwan ties after Taiwan's 2024 elections
The EU adheres to a one-China policy that recognises the government of the People's Republic of China (PRC) as the sole legitimate government of China. It does not therefore maintain diplomatic ties with Taiwan. The EU nonetheless shares with Taiwan common interests and values, including democracy, the rule of law and human rights. The general elections held in Taiwan in January 2024 once again testified to the maturity of the island's democracy. The EU engages Taiwan in a number of policy areas, ...
Accordi UE-Cile
Il 13 dicembre 2023 l'UE e il Cile hanno firmato un accordo quadro avanzato (AFA) al fine di aggiornare e sostituire l'accordo di associazione del 2002 che attualmente disciplina le relazioni tra loro. Durante la tornata di febbraio II il Parlamento europeo deciderà se approvare la conclusione, da parte dell'UE, dell'AFA, che è composto da due parti: i) dialogo politico e cooperazione; e ii) commercio e investimenti. Poiché l'AFA rientra nell'ambito della competenza concorrente, è necessaria anche ...
International Agreements in Progress: Modernisation of the trade pillar of the EU-Chile Association Agreement
On 9 December 2022, 20 years after the signature of the EU-Chile Association Agreement in 2002, the EU and Chile reached an agreement in principle on a new EU-Chile Advanced Framework Agreement, which comprises modernised trade and political and cooperation pillars. Negotiations were launched to modernise the 2002 Association Agreement, including its trade pillar, in November 2017, based on a Council negotiating mandate, which was the first-ever to have been published to enhance transparency and ...
Preview of the World Trade Organization's 2024 Ministerial Conference
The World Trade Organization (WTO) will hold its 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13) in Abu Dhabi from 26 to 29 February 2024. Priority items on the MC13 agenda are likely to include the reform of the WTO's dispute settlement function; new disciplines to eliminate fisheries subsidies that encourage overfishing and overcapacity, to complement the multilateral Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies adopted at MC12 in June 2022 and currently under ratification; the integration of the plurilateral Investment ...
Taiwan: 2024 elections
On 13 January 2024, voters in Taiwan will go to the polls to cast their votes for a successor to Tsai Ing-wen, the current independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) president, who is term-limited, and for 113 members of the Legislative Yuan. Alongside the future of cross-strait relations and regional peace and stability amid growing US-China strategic competition, Taiwan's economic vulnerabilities, its reliance on energy imports, high youth unemployment, stagnant wages and high housing ...
Relazioni UE-USA
In vista di un anno elettorale cruciale per il Parlamento europeo e gli Stati Uniti (USA), il Parlamento fa il punto sulle relazioni UE-USA per la seconda volta nella legislatura attuale, prossima alla sua conclusione. Mentre la relazione del 2021 del Parlamento illustrava le priorità per il rilancio dei legami transatlantici, la relazione del 2023 formula raccomandazioni volte ad approfondire la cooperazione su un'ampia gamma di questioni di politica estera, di sicurezza e di difesa. La relazione ...
EU anti-subsidy probe into electric vehicle imports from China
On 4 October 2023, the European Commission published a notice of initiation of EU anti-subsidy investigations into EU imports of battery electric vehicles (BEVs) from China. This has already been announced by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen during her State of the Union Address on 13 September 2023. She stated that the 'global market is flooded with cheaper electric vehicles' the price of which 'is kept artificially low' owing to 'huge state subsidies'. The probe comes after a ...
The US cybersecurity posture under Biden
In view of the rising frequency and sophistication of cyber-attacks hitting United States (US) targets and entailing widespread disruption of critical infrastructure, significant economic loss, and sensitive content and personal data leaks, the Biden administration has taken a series of steps to bolster the US cybersecurity posture since early 2021. Adding to President Biden's 2021 Executive Order on cybersecurity and 2022 Congressional legislation, the 2023 US National Cybersecurity Strategy lays ...