[CTC] Canada’s top trade official heads to Europe, complicating quick NAFTA wrap-up

[Arthur Stamoulis]

Politico Pro
Canada’s top trade official heads to Europe, complicating quick NAFTA wrap-up
  
By SABRINA RODRIGUEZ <https://subscriber.politicopro.com/staff/sabrina-rodriguez> and MEGAN CASSELLA <https://subscriber.politicopro.com/staff/megan-cassella>
 
08/24/2018 04:23 PM EDT
 
 
Hopes of getting a NAFTA deal by the end of the month appeared less likely after the Canada's top official overseeing the talks announced Friday that she’ll be in Europe for most of next week.
 
Canada has been expected to rejoin the talks once U.S. and Mexico wrap up talks on bilateral issues, which have been going on for five weeks on a senior level.
 
But Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, that nation‘s top trade official, just announced that she would visit Germany, Ukraine and France Aug. 26-30.

Negotiators from all three NAFTA partners – U.S., Canada and Mexico – would have to reach a deal by Aug. 31 or Sept. 1 at the latest if they hope to get it signed before Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto leaves office at the end of November.

For days, senior officials had been optimistic that U.S. and Mexico could wrap up their two-way talks this week. But negotiators from the U.S. and Mexico have been unable to reach a breakthrough on the remaining bilateral NAFTA issues, Mexican Economy Secretary Ildefonso Guajardo said Friday.

“We’re still working and we’ll continue to work through the weekend,” Guajardo said after he left a three-and-a-half-hour meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer. “We don’t have flights for any day because we know this will continue."

Guajardo, for his part, said that Freeland confirmed to him “that she will be available in the moment we think we can have trilateral re-engagement.”

Guajardo de-emphasized that disagreements between the current negotiating team and Mexican President-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s transition team were stalling the talks. News reports <https://www.wsj.com/articles/mexicos-president-elect-balks-at-including-energy-chapter-in-new-nafta-1534882819> suggest that there’s a split between teams over the inclusion of a chapter on energy investment in NAFTA 2.0, a policy area that was not included in the original agreement.

“We are working as one team – a team called Mexico. And we have to make sure that everyone feels comfortable with this agreement,” Guajardo said.

However, one source close to the talks told POLITICO that energy has indeed been the primary hold-up in recent days. Current Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto had agreed with the Trump administration to include the energy investment chapter, but López Obrador’s negotiating team has resisted doing so because the incoming administration is concerned about opening up private and foreign investment in energy.

López Obrador’s pick for chief negotiator, Jesús Seade, was present for meetings earlier this week at the headquarters of the U.S. Trade Representative but returned to Mexico on Wednesday — a trip the source said was aimed at resolving differences over the energy chapter.

Seade on Wednesday played down the split on the issue, saying "what we want is for the constitution to be respected and to have clarity that everything in the agreement is consistent."

Officials and experts are still optimistic that bilateral talks could wrap up in the coming days.

"Both sides have a reason to do something now. AMLO wants it before Dec. 1. He doesn't want to be spending time on it. He doesn't want to inherit it," former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez told POLITICO.

Gutierrez, current chair at Albright Stonebridge Group, adding that President Donald Trump is also eager to "get it out of the way."

Guajardo said Friday afternoon he is “on call” and could return to the USTR’s offices later in the afternoon.

Arthur Stamoulis
Citizens Trade Campaign
(202) 494-8826




-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.citizenstrade.org/pipermail/ctcfield-citizenstrade.org/attachments/20180825/05b70c4e/attachment.html>