Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-09-14-Speech-1-189"
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"en.20090914.26.1-189"2
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"Mr President, I must say I am rather concerned about the tone of this debate. With the exception, perhaps, of Daniel Caspary’s contribution, it has been rather negative.
I was Parliament’s rapporteur on the Korean Free Trade Agreement. In advance of this debate, I looked back on what we had decided to ask for – what we asked the Commission to go into in these negotiations and achieve on our behalf – and I actually think the Commission has achieved what we asked them to achieve. I would like to pay tribute to the chief negotiator, who I see sitting next to Baroness Ashton, and to Baroness Ashton herself, for the way they have delivered this agreement.
Clearly, in any free trade agreement – by definition – and in any negotiation, there are winners and losers, but if you look at the global impact of this agreement, there are big winners in Europe and there are big winners in Korea. Therefore, there are big winners in keeping world trade moving. At this current time, in this present crisis, anything that sends a positive signal about two units as big as Korea and as big as the European Union that we want to keep trade moving and we want to keep trade open has to be a good thing.
I have to say that, if the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers cannot move this agreement to a final signed agreement between Korea and the EU, we might as well send a note to DG Trade to stop negotiating all other free trade agreements because, if we do not deliver on Korea, forget ASEAN, forget the Gulf States, forget the whole other raft of FTAs we are trying to negotiate, and, frankly, forget Doha. This is an important agreement, where Europe has achieved its strategic objectives. Let us send a positive signal to the rest of the world that Europe is open for business and that, in the teeth of this recession, we are keen to keep our markets as open as possible."@en1
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