Stop EPAs Day: 7 years to blame

Despite pressure from the EU, only one out of six regions has concluded a full regional trade deal so far. Whilst a number of countries were pressured into interim Agreements at the end of 2007 under the threat of losing market access to the EU, more than half of the ACP countries have not agreed to any form of EPA, such is their degree of concern with these agreements. Many ACP countries are calling for the deals not to be signed and for contentious clauses to be renegotiated.

Through a collective mass fax and e-mail action, more than 80 organisations in 30 countries across Europe, Africa and the Pacific have called on decision-makers to fundamentally change the course of the ongoing negotiations on Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) between the European Union and ACP countries. The EU approach to these negotiations is the main problem, activists say.

EPAs were supposed to promote ACP countries’ development and regional integration, but the EU’s approach to the negotiations has undermined these objectives. "Concluding EPAs on this basis – the NGOs wrote in the document - would severely constrain ACP countries’ scope to maintain or introduce measures to support their economies and to defend jobs, food security, environmental sustainability and any efforts to build regional integration in Africa.

In their faxes and e-mails, activists and campaigners accuse the European Commission of pressuring ACP-Countries to take on new obligations that go beyond WTO compatibility requirements. They urge European decision-makers to allow flexible market access arrangements and to meet ACP requests for the re-negotiation of contentious issues included in the agreements. ACP civil society organisations call on their governments to stand firm and not to give in to EU pressures. They demand that the ACP governments suspend negotiations as long as the financial crisis rages in their countries.

Link to the document: http://www.amicideipopoli.org/web/index.php?page=home-2