High Hopes But Different Priorities At EU-US Summit

by Ulrika Lomas, Tax-News.com, Brussels

03 May 2002

As both parties expressed their priorities and hopes prior to yesterday's summit meeting between the European Union and the United States, it became clear that EU and US officials had very different agendas for the talks.

The summit meeting was called in order to ease tensions between the Bush administration and European leaders over issues such as the Middle East, the war on terrorism, and the trade war which has rapidly escalated between the world's two largest trading powers, following an American decision to impose 30% import tariffs on steel products.

In media briefings and statements released before the meeting, however, US officials revealed that they were keener to concentrate on the ongoing international anti-terrorist campaign and the Middle Eastern situation than they were to focus on the issue of compensation for the trade losses caused by the steel import tax, and by a long-disputed tax break for American exporters ruled illegal by the World Trade Organisation.

'Europe and the United States see that our common and fundamental interests and values far outweigh our differences,' the US's National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice told foreign policy students in Washington on Monday. The AFP news service also quoted an unnamed American official as revealing that: 'counter-terrorism is our top priority at this particular meeting'.

Although the European Commission's President, Romano Prodi, told reporters in Brussels this week that: 'Our objective is to take stock of progress achieved, take matters further and to look at solutions on issues,' privately, his feelings on the United States at present seem to be a little less measured and reasonable, as can be evidenced by the May 1 AFP report.

Olivier Knox, reporting from Washington, revealed on Wednesday that Mr Prodi had 'vowed to use a White House meeting Thursday with Bush to give him an earful about US support for recent Israeli military operations and his decision to slap tariffs on steel imports.'

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