EU likely to push for comprehensive accord with US

The EU is likely to push ahead more urgently on agreeing a comprehensive and sometimes controversial trade agreement with the US after President Barack Obama said it would open the door to imports of cheap American gas.

Europe needs to take tough decisions, such as allowing fracking, to decrease its energy dependence on Russia, Obama told EU Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso and president of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy.

At what was described as an intense and cordial 65-minute meeting over lunch, the two Europeans and the US President stated their positions on the Russia threat, NATO, energy, climate change and the economy. They also explained their difficulties in getting 28 member states to agree to anything on the one hand, and getting a Congress facing mid-term elections to play ball on the other.

The EU, led by Britain, has been pushing the USA to share some of its surplus gas bonanza with Europe to help reduce it’s 40% dependency on Russian energy. But Obama explained that the process chosen is to issue licences to companies and then sell it on the open market.

The good news was that new licences were likely to be issued. But if both sides had signed the TTIP (trade agreement) then the EU would be entitled to share in American gas that could be shipped in the form of LPG.

Obama made it clear that he considered that energy had now become a strategic issue and warned at a press conference that the EU and the US were “united in our determination to isolate Russia and extract costs” for their actions.

But his message was quite clear: Don’t rely on others, nothing comes free and tough choices have to be made.

EU Ambassador to the US Joao Vale de Almeida, who attended the meeting, said that there was a debate over whether to hold onto their gas and so disadvantage other countries or to get the best price they could for it now. But Americans were realising that Russia was using their gas as a weapon, a realisation that could be helpful to the EU.

President Obama concentrated during the press conference on reassuring Europeans on the issues that have created most suspicion on the trade deal: consumers and environmental rights would be trampled on and it would benefit big business to the detriment of others.

Mr Vale de Almeida said there was a very clear commitment to move with a sense of urgency on the TTIP, with both sides saying they were happy with progress to date.

President Obama, who also visited NATO during his day-long visit to Brussels, made it quite clear that while Russia’s seizure of Crimea has re-invigorated the transatlantic military body, Ukraine is unlikely to get membership, soothing Moscow’s fears.

EU president Herman Van Rompuy raised the issue of the US and the NSA surveillance telling the US President it was unacceptable, but then stressing he was sure they would reach an accommodation.