EU, Canada sign CETA amid protests

The trade deal has triggered massive protests over concerns that it will harm European local businesses and agriculture and create a “dictatorship of corporations.”

Trudeau was meant to fly to Brussels last Wednesday but postponed his trip after the Wallonia region raised objections. The road to the agreement has been bumpy, with massive protests breaking out in a number of European countries, including France, Germany, Poland and Spain.

On Thursday, FreeWestMedia reported that Belgium’s regional parliaments endorsed a compromise deal, addressing concerns about competition for Wallonia’s farmers from Canada, on Friday.

During the signing, protesters nevertheless attempted to break through police barricades and the security fence at the European Council building in Brussels in an effort to derail the signing. The demonstration escalated into violent clashes.

Both Donald Tusk, the president of the European council, and Trudeau smiled triumphantly at a news conference to announce the news, with Jean-Claude Juncker, European Commission President, looking more circumspect.

Juncker denied that a future Brexit deal with the EU would face similar difficulties.

Germany’s Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel also praised Sunday’s signing of the deal, saying that it marks the beginning of a more “just” approach to globalization.

The Canada agreement is seen as a springboard to a larger EU deal with the United States, known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Treaty (TTIP), which has been the target of labour unions and environmental and other protest groups.

EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom said TTIP talks were not dead, contrary to what some politicians in Germany and France have said. She said talks would resume after the next US president takes office in January,

For Canada the deal is important to reduce its reliance on the neighbouring United States as an export market.

Fears that CETA is merely a backdoor for multinational corporations to override decisions by democratically elected national governments have been a major factor in opposition to the deal by many activists.

Many regard CETA as a precedent for an even bigger and more controversial EU-US trade deal, TTIP. There have been major upheavals across Europe at both deals, which opponents say could undermine European standards for healthcare and consumer protection and threaten jobs.

Multinationals are likely to abuse the deals’ provision for arbitration panels to rule on disputes, and start dictating public policy, including environmental standards.

Pascoe Sabido from the Corporate Europe Observatory, a non-profit research and campaign group which examines the effects of corporate lobbying on EU policy, told RT that CETA essentially hands power over to corporate interests at the expense of ordinary Europeans.

“This has been a deal written by, and with, big business,” Sabido told RT. “You can see it in who’s coming out. SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises] have said, ‘We’re not in favor of CETA or TTIP.’ Those who are cheerleading it are those very same big businesses so you have more rights being handed over to big business, you have their investors being protected, and ultimately what we’re seeing is the profits of the biggest businesses put before the interests of European citizens and those across Europe who actually want to have a decent quality of life.”

CETA removes 99 percent of customs duties between Canada, the world’s 10th largest economy, and the single EU market of 500 million people.