Cloak of Secrecy Fuels Anxiety Over Trans-Atlantic Trade Talks

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/17/world/europe/ttip-eu-us-trade-deal.html

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PARIS — Opposition to a sweeping trade deal between the United States and the European Union has gathered strength in Europe in recent weeks, but with a twist: The latest objections have less to do with what is known to be at stake, and more about what is unknown.

A leak of documents by Greenpeace, the environmental organization, in early May added to suspicions about the deal, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, as opponents turned the three-year debate away from trade issues to a broader denunciation of the secrecy surrounding the talks.

While Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany defended the treaty during a visit to her country by President Obama in late April, Sigmar Gabriel, the economy minister in her coalition government, led the charge for greater transparency.

Secrecy, Mr. Gabriel said, only “creates a lot of conspiracy; this creates mistrust.”

Both American and European negotiators dismissed the Greenpeace leaks as “misleading at best” and “flatly wrong,” contending that they reflected a work in progress, not final documents.

But opponents say the leaked documents pointed to a need for greater openness — or at least clarification — on a subject that has become politically toxic on both sides of the Atlantic. Supporters accuse European governments of failing to defend a process that they set in motion in 2013.

According to a popular European perspective, the closed-door strategy is an American condition that is putting European citizens, their agricultural products and strict environmental standards at the mercy of United States-based corporations.

“The way is being cleared for a race to the bottom in environmental, consumer protection and public health standards,” Greenpeace said.

Both sides agree that confidentiality is essential to any sensitive negotiations — a condition that was applied to earlier trade talks involving the European Union and other countries, with little objection in European capitals.

For their part, the Americans point to steps taken by the Obama administration, in its negotiations over the trade pact with Europe and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a similar agreement covering the United States and 11 other Pacific Rim nations.

To strike a balance between secrecy and transparency, for instance, members of Congress and 600 identified stakeholders — environmentalists, unions and companies — have been given security clearance to regularly review the American negotiating positions.

In Europe, parliamentary deputies have also been given access to working documents, but under strict conditions that some European politicians find objectionable.

The documents can be viewed only at guarded sites, and French deputies have complained that the information amounts to little more than “tactical summaries” that provide few details on the state of negotiations.

Since 2013, Europe has scored points by publicly taking some sensitive subjects off the table, starting with a “cultural exception” for movies and other audiovisual materials, a demand first put forward by France.

Last October, the European Commission, which is handling the negotiations on behalf of the European Union, issued an official reassurance that the fixed price for books — a practice cherished by European publishers and bookshops as a protection against chain store discounts — was not up for negotiation.

But there is still a great deal of uncertainty, and anxiety, over a broad range of subjects that may, or may not, lead to lower standards for food safety and the environment, a rise in pharmaceutical prices and other issues that have struck fear in the hearts of many in Europe.

Negotiators on both sides have had to bat back rumors of an American takeover of the British health care system, or the privatization of the Bavarian water supply — neither of which is on the table.

However, so-called geographical indications, a European practice that gives regions the exclusive right to label their products — like Parma ham, or Roquefort cheese — remain a heated issue. American negotiators argue that these products are protected under existing trademark law, which the Europeans regard as too loose.

In France, geographical indications are regarded as sacrosanct, a “red line” that no government would dare to cross.

Earlier this month, President François Hollande of France bowed to popular opinion when he said that the country’s position on the treaty, as it now stands, would be “no.”

But where do negotiations stand? That is an open question.