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Canada welcomes EU proposal to become 'associate member'

284 points · 354 comments · witweb

  1. jorblumesea · · focus · HN ↗
    EU is notoriously fractured and divided in the best of times, especially around membership. Importantly, many EU countries have not ratified CETA, and that was put in place in 2017.

    FT is a pro transatlanticism but has a somewhat negative take on all of this

    <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ft.com&#x2F;content&#x2F;2e2e0c1e-51d6-49e2-9f4a-6ef793908b85?syn-25a6b1a6=1" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ft.com&#x2F;content&#x2F;2e2e0c1e-51d6-49e2-9f4a-6ef793908...

    1. bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗
      98% of CETA has been ratified. The last 2% is the hard part, but the 98% covers a lot of goods...
      1. jorblumesea · · focus · HN ↗
        10 member countries including France and Italy have not ratified ceta, how is that 98%? it&#x27;s hard to believe excluding france and italy gets you to most of the EU goods and services.
        1. bryanlarsen · · focus · HN ↗
          98% of the goods listed in CETA are tariff free.
          1. jorblumesea · · focus · HN ↗
            sure but the most important piece, the ICS, is still frozen and will remain blocked indefinitely.

            what you have is just a provisionally agreed upon free trade agreement. It&#x27;s a long way from its original goal. Also if a single member country doesn&#x27;t ratify, it&#x27;s pulling the plug on ceta. It&#x27;s in a legal grey zone and will probably remain in that state forever, due to ICS being so controversial to EU member states.

            CETA isn&#x27;t in a good place right now and it&#x27;s yet another sign that EU doesn&#x27;t want as deep economic integration as Canada leaders are selling. Canadian leadership is pushing hard and it makes sense, good for the common Canadian, but the EU is more skeptical and doesn&#x27;t see the same value add.

            this is also the conclusion that the FT article came to, Canada isn&#x27;t as lucrative of a trade partner as they are selling to the Canadian people.

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