LISBON – Portuguese Prime Minister Luís Montenegro backed the EU’s Mercosur trade agreement on Wednesday, saying that Europe would set a “bad example” if it failed to implement an agreement negotiated over 25 years.
He argued that the agreement with the South American trading bloc “opens up a commercial space with more than 700 million consumers” and gives Europe “the advantage of being able to demand reciprocity in the rules applicable to companies on both sides of the Atlantic”.
“We set a bad example if we fail to implement an agreement that we ourselves negotiated,” Montenegro argued in parliament during the preparatory debate ahead of the European Council meeting, which will take place on 26-27 June in Brussels. “It weakens our economy and our position as a bloc if we are not consistent with what we ourselves advocate.”
Responding to the right wing Chega Party, which criticised the “harmful effects” of this agreement on Portugal, Montenegro said opponents were “not seeing the full scope of this agreement”.
The deal, he stressed, “guarantees and safeguards” as well as “equal treatment and reciprocity for producers, particularly agricultural producers, on environmental rules, procedural rules and trade rules”.
EU states remain divided on the agreement, with France the loudest opponent. Euractiv reported this week that the European Commission is expected to present its proposal on the agreement before the summer break in late July.
(edited by Pedro Sousa Carvalho)