The European Parliament on Wednesday put on hold a trade deal between the United States and the European Union.
The EU Parliament’s trade committee has decided to freeze the ratification vote indefinitely for the trade deal, amid US President Donald Trump’s repeated threats over seizing Greenland, Bloomberg reported.
Ties between the US and its European allies have turned tense over America’s proposal to acquire Greenland, also affecting the transatlantic alliance. US President Trump has threatened to slap additional tariffs on eight European countries, including United Kingdom, if they oppose this plan.
In a statement, chair of European Parliament’s trade committee Bernd Lange said America is “undermining the stability and predictability of EU-US trade relations” by “threatening the territorial integrity and sovereignty of an EU member state and by using tariffs as a coercive instrument.”
Lange added that owing to this, EU was “left with no alternative but to suspend work” on the trade deal, according to Bloomberg. The chairperson further stated that the work would not move forward “until the US decides to reengage on a path of cooperation rather than confrontation.”
Trump says Greenland ‘small ask’, highlights its ‘key strategic location’
In his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos in Wednesday, Trump said Greenland was a “small ask compared to what we have given them (Denmark and NATO) for many, many decades.”
He highlighted the island territory’s strategic location between US, Russia and China, and said the US needed it for national and international security.
Trump over the weekend said that a 10% tariff will be levied starting February 1 for eight European countries, rising to 25% in June, unless he gets a deal for the “purchase of Greenland.” This led to EU lawmakers reconsidering their expected ratification vote on the US trade deal, struck last July.
The pact, which set a 15% tariff on most EU goods in exchange for a pledge to erase all tariffs on US industrial goods and some agricultural products, was seen as an EU effort to avoid a trade war with the US, Bloomberg reported.
However, the proposal for the acquisition of Greenland has changed the scenario, giving way to European criticism that the pact had too many concessions to the US.
