The European Commission will today brief the Parliament's International Trade Committee. The Western Sahara intergroup of the Parliament expressed today its deep concern of the Commission's approach.
On 20 February, the European Commission is to brief the INTA committee of the European Parliament regarding the EU-Morocco trade negotiations.
UPDATE, 21.02.2018. See the debate on Parliament's website (from 17:25:50+).
The leaders of the Western Sahara Intergroup at the Parliament today sent a letter to their colleagues in the INTA committee, expressing their "deep concern". Download the letter here.
The parliamentarians are concerned about the lack of transparency, the rushed concluding of the negotiations, and the EU Commission's misreading of the conclusions of the Court of Justice of the EU.
"We cannot stress enough the need for the EU to live up to the rulings of its own court. Otherwise, and in a time when the European Commission has activated article 7 procedures against Poland over its breaches of the rule of law, the credibility of the European Union is at stake", the parliamentarians stress.
The European Parliament has expressed itself in favour of holding debates in three parliament committees about the exclusion of Western Sahara from EU-Morocco trade agreements.
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Two weeks ago, the EU Commission announced that products from Western Sahara should be labelled accordingly, only to withdraw that statement the very next day. Today, the Commission reaffirms its original position.