Brussels considers “unacceptable” the 30% tariff announced by Trump and presents value measures worth 72,000 million | International

Brussels continues to hold his hand to Washington, but the fist is also ready to close. The European Commissioner for Commerce, Maros Sefcovic, has received on Monday the firm support of the 27 Member States to continue trying to reach a commercial agreement with the United States. But after him Rate On the Saturday of the US President, Donald Trump, who announced by letter tariffs of 30% to European products from August 1, the EU closes ranks. Before a “effectively prohibitive for mutual trade” rate, Brussels has presented to the Foreign and Commerce ministers a second package of countermeasures for 72,000 million euros in case the negotiations fail.

“30% is absolutely unacceptable. It is an absolutely prohibitive level for any trade,” SEFCOVIC insisted at the end of the appointment of ministers, in which it has not hidden its “deep disappointment” by Trump’s letter when, he has revealed, he believed to have practically closed last week a principle of agreement that would have stopped the tariff escalation. The Slovak has received the virtually unanimous support of the EU members – Hungary has once again been the loose verse by criticizing the performance of Brussels, which he has accused of not being “firm and assertive” sufficiently before Washington – to continue trying, without rest, a “mutually beneficial” solution before August 1 set by Trump as a new deadline. In fact, this Monday, the Slovak had planned new conversations with its interlocutors in Washington, a city that does not rule out traveling again in the next few hours or days.

“We are still convinced that our transatlantic relationship deserves a negotiated solution that leads to renewed stability and cooperation (…) The EU never abandons (negotiation) without a genuine effort, especially in view of the hard work already invested and how close we are to achieve an agreement, as well as the clear benefits of a negotiated solution,” said the veteran commissioner.

But after those efforts is the increasingly firm awareness, SEFCOVIC has also recognized, that you have to be prepared for the possibility that the long -awaited agreement does not occur. A message that has come from all ministers in the “strongest way since the beginning of discussions with the US”, as he has revealed to journalists. The reason is that everyone is convinced of the need to “protect the jobs, business and our economy” at the time to be negotiated, which requires “preparing at the same time” the measures of commercial “rebalancing” without discarding either, although no one wants to put on that extreme scenario, the possibility of activating the EU anticoration instrument. “Everything is on the table, but let’s go step by step,” said Sefcovic.

“If you want Peace, prepare for war. And there we are,” the situation had summarized at the beginning of the meeting in Brussels Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lars Lokke Rasmussen, whose country presides over the Council in the second half of this year. Bated Puerta, Sefcovic has advanced that throughout the day the second list of American products identified by the commission would arrive at the commission to respond to US tariffs in case of US tariffs in case an agreement is not achieved. The list, which initially amounted to about 95,000 million euros, has finally been reduced to 72,000 million, as confirmed by the Commission.

If that second replica is finally approved, it would be added to which it is suspended, which is equivalent to about 20,000 million. That is, the EU response, for the moment, would be somewhat greater than 90,000 million. That would affect just under a third of European imports from the United States, which implies that the replica of the twenty -seven would be very far from the blow of Washington, which reaches 70% of EU’s exports to the other side of the Atlantic.

“We cannot be naive,” said the Spanish head of Economics (and Commerce), Carlos Corpora, who has also closed ranks with the community executive.

“There is a unit of action and support for the action of the commission in these negotiations with the intention of continuing to seek an agreement in these two and a half weeks that remain until the top date of early August,” according to the Spanish minister. But in this, it has pointed out, we must continue talking “also understanding that we cannot be naive and that we have to raise a scenario in which there is no agreement and prepare re -quilibrium measures if that scenario occurred.” Spain wants to think about this strategy beyond the backlash to Washington: it proposes that an “umbrella mechanism” be explored to protect the European industry and companies that are believed, at least in part, with the tariffs that can be collected from the reprisals of tariffs to the United States, an option that, body has indicated, the European commissioner has been arranged to “investigate” in the coming weeks.

However, in the European Defense Strategy for this commercial war there is not only the return of blows. The extension of destinations for exports and, therefore, of more commercial alliances in other areas of the world is also sought. “The US represents about 13% of the global trade. So there is another 87% and I think we all see opportunities in other parts of the world to reach out to Europe,” said Danish minister Rasmussen a day after the European Commission announced a political agreement with Indonesia to close a trade treaty in the coming months. At the Danish presidency on duty, Rasmussen has stressed, it is also “to make Mercosur cross the finish line” before the end of the year. He referred to the commercial agreement that Brussels tries to formalize with the Latin American block composed of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay and that would become the main Pact for the EU.