A “tsunami” will strike the peoples if TTIP is approved
Statement of Georgos Loucaides, AKEL Press Spokesperson
AKEL C.C. Press Office, 16th June 2015, Nicosia
The attempts underway to conclude the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between the United States and the European Union will shake the very foundations the global economic system to its roots. TTIP is all about establishing an “economic NATO” that will also be the EU’s and US’ response to the emergence and rise of the BRICS countries.
The goal is to establish a single Euro-Atlantic market where the multinational monopolies will operate unchecked and unimpeded. Given that fees and duties between the EU and US are already at very low levels, TTIP is targeting other “obstacles”. Labour gains, consumer protection, food safety standards and environmental standards existing in the EU are being negotiated with the US evidently in order to curb and downgrade to the corresponding levels that are in force in the US.
What will this mean for the working people when throughout the whole of Europe the terms and conditions of the business giants of the US will be imposed – a country that stubbornly refuses even to ratify the Conventions of the International Labour Organization on fundamental labor rights? Why does the US insist in the negotiations on the abolition of collective agreements, which are characterized as “an obstacle to investment”? Won’t the setback be dramatic or not for the living standards of the peoples of Europe if a convergence is agreed between the Americans and the clearly more advanced European framework on GMO products, food safety, chemical addictives, cosmetics, pollutants of air transport and the protection animals?
Instead of recovering the losses the peoples have suffered during the crisis, the ruling classes, on both sides of the Atlantic, are scheming behind closed doors to agree on a deal that is tantamount to new – fiercer than ever before – attacks on the living standards and working conditions of European, but also American working people. Furthermore, it is obvious that TTIP will deal the fatal blow to SME’s in the countries of the EU.
In Europe, the wave of resistance to TTIP is growing and Brussels is finding it difficult to win the consent of the peoples, even within the European Parliament itself. Besides, this is also the reason why last week the European People’s Party, the Social Democrats and Conservatives hastily postponed the vote on the issue.
It is not surprising that in this confrontation, the Anastasiades Government has lined up on the side of the European Commission and the multinational monopolies that are exerting pressure to pass and approve the TTIP. AKEL on the other hand is uniting its voice together with the Left in Europe, the trade unions and movements that are waging the battle against TTIP, against the new anti-people’s “tsunami” that is threatening to strike the peoples of Europe.
