EP Committee votes to smoothen transatlantic trade 

An own-initiative report on Transatlantic economic relations written by MEP Erika Mann (PES, Germany) and adopted in the Parliament's Trade Committee on 18 April 2006 stops short of calling for the abolition of tariffs. Instead it calls for the abolition of non-tariff barriers in financial services by 2010 and in a number of other key markets by 2015. An agreement envisaged would rest on three pillars: 

• cooperation on regulatory issues 
• a set of operational cooperation tools (an early warning system, a bilateral mechanism for settling trade disputes and a third-generation agreement on the application of competition law) 
• sectoral economic cooperation agreements building on the joint EU-US work programme

In addition the MEPs call for a strengthening of the parliamentary dimension of transatlantic dialogue on trade. The vote comes at a critical stage of EU-US trade relations, with time running out for a deal in the Doha trade round to be concluded by early May. As part of a major reshuffle of President Bush's team, the influential US trade representative Rob Portman has just been replaced by the more junior Susan Schwab who, commentators say, will have a harder time trying to convince the US Congress of the need of more liberal international trade rules.