After today’s vote on the resolution on the upcoming EU-US Summit (in Lisbon on November 20), Reinhard Bütikofer, Member of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations for the United States, stated:
In the run up to the EU-US summit the European Parliament sees the resuscitation of the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC) as a clear priority. The TEC was started at the initiative of Chancellor Angela Merkel in 2007, but it has done nothing memorable to date and has been repeatedly called into question by the US side.
Commissioner DeGucht is now trying for a new beginning. He has wide support for that in Parliament. At its next meeting in December the Transatlantic Economic Council must finally put its money where its mouth is. That includes a clear agenda regarding joint efforts to promote low-carbon technologies as well as shared priorities for global economic initiatives.
One gets the impression that Europe currently is not being taken seriously in Washington; Europe seems to be taken for granted there. At the TEC it remains to be seen if the US and Europe can at least find relevant common ground on economic issues.
