Exclusive: Deal on EU-ACP accord expected this week

BRUSSELS — The European Commission and Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States are expected to reach a political agreement on their new partnership this Thursday, sources close to the negotiations told Devex. Substantial progress came at technical-level meetings in mid-November, allowing chief negotiators Robert Dussey, the Togolese foreign minister, and Jutta Urpilainen, the European Union commissioner responsible for development policy, to schedule a virtual meeting for Thursday. A senior OACPS official told Devex Monday that “there is not likely to be any issue left unresolved” by the time the chief negotiators meet. A commission spokesperson said, “We hope and expect that both Chief Negotiators Urpilainen and Dussey will be able to endorse the final compromise package, which will allow [the parties] to conclude the negotiations on the text of the future agreement.” The text will replace the Cotonou Agreement, in place since 2000, which governs trade, political, and development relations between the EU and almost 80 OACP states. Talks on a post-Cotonou accord began in September 2018 under previous EU development commissioner Neven Mimica, and concluding them was one of the top priorities for his successor, Urpilainen, when she took office a year ago. The timeline slipped however, as each new deadline set by the Finnish commissioner passed without an agreement. That led Urpilainen to issue an “ultimatum” to the OACPS side over summer, telling them that delays risked prompting EU states that were skeptical about the continued relevance of the bloc’s partnership with the three separate regions to withdraw their support. The delays also meant extending the Cotonou accord, initially meant to expire on Feb. 29 this year, first to Dec. 31, 2020, and now likely to Nov. 30, 2021. In a move likely to disappoint activists and progressive EU member states, the text — which also covers the human rights and democratic principles underpinning sustainable development — contains no explicit mention of protections for “sexual orientation and gender identity,” which would have represented an advance on the Cotonou agreement. The text does however include a list of grounds for nondiscrimination, including sex, ethnic or social origin, religion or belief, political or any other opinion, disability, age, or other status — the last of which has been interpreted as covering LGBT rights. On sexual and reproductive health and rights, the text includes commitments to the Beijing Platform for Action on women’s rights and the International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action. On migration, the EU dropped its demand that OACP states accept EU travel documents for migrants forced to leave the EU but prevailed in keeping a reference to shorter timeframes for returns. Meanwhile, OACPS nuanced the EU demand that migrants expelled from the bloc be accepted “without conditionality” by adding the right to conduct certain other verifications; and the EU agreed to a dialogue on the pension rights of migrants returning from Europe, even though the commission had argued this should be dealt with bilaterally between states. The one area where the senior OACPS official admitted that “we have not gotten the ideal solution” is the status of the previous Joint Parliamentary Assembly under the Cotonou Agreement. The European Parliament — which must vote to approve but cannot amend the new agreement — has consistently said that a continuation of the biannual meetings between its members and representatives of national parliaments from OACP countries was a red line for it supporting the deal. Charles Goerens, a liberal MEP from Luxembourg and one of the most experienced members on the development committee, told Devex Monday that the JPA is important to allow parliament to exert influence while playing its necessary role in EU external relations. The commission claimed that a continued JPA was not in its mandate from EU member states. Instead, it proposed a compromise whereby the separate parliamentary committees for each of the three OACPS regions could come together for ad hoc joint meetings with MEPs. However, on Sep. 28, Tomas Tobé, the center-right Swedish chair of the European Parliament’s development committee, seemed to shoot down that idea, telling MEPs that “a possible optional meeting of the three regional parliamentary assemblies cannot replace the solid and constructive parliamentary partnership that we do have.” For now, the commission appears to be betting that the parliament — already separately engaged in difficult talks with the EU executive on MEPs’ power over development spending for the next seven years — won’t block the entire accord over the issue of the curtailed parliamentary assembly. But Goerens is among those calling for a “hard line.” Speaking in a personal capacity, he told Devex Monday that unless a permanent and overarching parliamentary dimension was added to the post-Cotonou accord, including by changing the instructions from EU member states if necessary, then MEPs should threaten to delay their consent for the deal. If they are still not satisfied, Goerens said MEPs should “find a majority to harden our position further.” “The European Parliament, in the EU treaties and international agreements, has an evident [legal] competence. If it doesn’t use that ability, then it won’t be called a parliament much longer,” Goerens said. Should the overarching parliamentary meeting be diluted then Goerens said “we can also ask why have an ACP accord?” Given exchanges are set to continue between EU and OACP countries at ministerial level, Goerens said, “I don’t see why they would end only one institution.” Once the commission and OACPS announce their political agreement the text will undergo official translation, with a formal signing expected next year. Update, Dec. 1, 2020: This article has been updated to clarify the timing of the technical meetings