Search Results for: European Parliament

BY KEITH NUTHALL
TALKS were held this week between the USA and the European Union (Feb 13) in Washington DC over the threat of safeguard duties that the Bush administration is threatening to impose on certain steel imports into America. Unusually in a case where the EU is a complainant, the US suggested the formal talks; while accepting the offer in a note to the World Trade Organisation, Brussels said that it also wanted a further round of talks, quoting WTO safeguard rules requiring “adequate opportunity for prior consultation on the measure that the United States is seeking to apply.”…

BY ALAN OSBORN
BINDING EU legislation to curb noise pollution – in particular the noise from rail, road and air traffic and building sites – is to be proposed within four years under an agreement reached by the European Parliament and EU government ministers regarding the proposed new noise directive.…

KEITH NUTHALL
A STRING of cases have been launched by the European Commission against Member States of the European Union to try and force them to comply with EU water legislation; under existing rules, failure to abide by the court’s rulings can see national governments being hit with huge daily recurring fines of up to Euro 100,000.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE REQUIREMENT that 20 per cent of fresh beef meat and offal imported into the European Union from the USA should be tested for the presence of banned hormones is to be lifted, after EU vets approved a proposal from the European Commission.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Union ministers have been formally asked to approve the shipping agreement negotiated with China last year by the European Commission; the deal covers commercial, safety and security maritime issues and could be formally signed at a planned EU-China summit at the end of this year.…

KEITH NUTHALL
A NORWEGIAN salmon producer which had been hit with European Union anti-dumping and countervailing duties after failing to file compulsory performance reports with the European Commission, is expected to be freed from having to pay the tariffs.

Gje-Vi AS was ordered in 1998 to pay the duties, because Brussels claimed that it had broken promises not to dump salmon on European markets and to prove with its accounts that it was trading fairly.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
CLAIMS that the compulsory scale of fees paid to Italian lawyers is illegal under European Union competition legislation have been thrown out by the European Court of Justice, which has ruled that the system is a reasonable act of the national government.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EXPOSURE of European Union citizens to man-made radiation increased by about 76 per cent between 1987 and 1996, a new European Commission report has claimed, citing discharges from reprocessing plants in Britain (Sellafield) and Normandy, France, (Cap de la Hague) as the “most important” sources of this pollution increase.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A RESIDENCY qualification for directors of companies established in the Alpine Principality of Liechtenstein, set up to help its authorities fight abuse of its liberal business laws, including money laundering, has been declared illegal.

The European Free Trade Area Court has ruled that the regulation discriminates against citizens of other EFTA countries, (Switzerland, Iceland and Norway), breaching fair trade treaty commitments made by Liechtenstein on joining the association.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED States has released details of the talks held with the European Union over its threatened safeguard duties on certain steel imports into America. Washington said that it had responded to questions about the US International Trade Commission’s timeframe for identifying and defining like products; the establishment of a causal link between increased imports and serious injury to US producers; and the methodology for selecting a safeguard measure, among other issues.…