EU asks for written responses from Switzerland to advance talks

The EU has said that institutional issues have to be resolved before talks on agreements can continue Keystone / Francois Walschaerts / Pool

The European Union has asked Switzerland to send written responses to a series of open questions as talks seem unable to resolve the current political impasse and to advance negotiations on individual agreements.

According to Swiss public broadcaster SRF, Switzerland’s approach to negotiating separate agreements with the EU Commission is being met with great scepticism by the 27-member bloc. Last week, Switzerland’s chief negotiator Livia Leu met with the European Commission’s Juraj Nociar to move the discussion forward in a bid to overcome the current impasse between Brussels and Bern after the Swiss shelved an overarching framework deal governing long-term ties almost exactly a year ago.

This treaty would have replaced more than 120 bilateral deals which have regulated relations for the past decades. Switzerland is now forced to negotiate each agreement on an individual basis.

Some of the open issues include the role of the European Court of Justice, the dynamic adoption of EU laws, rules on state aid and the free movement of people. Despite talks, the EU still doesn’t have a clear picture of the concrete solutions being proposed by Switzerland, wrote SRF on Wednesday.

In response to a request from SRF, the European Commission said it had sent a letter to the Swiss government requesting a written response to open questions. Only after these responses are provided can the EU bloc assess whether the Swiss government’s proposals provide a foundation for further negotiations on separate sectoral agreements.

Earlier this week, the EU Ambassador to Switzerland, Petros Mavromichalis, told the Neue Zürcher Zeitung newspaper that certain issues, such as a legal mechanism for dispute settlement, had to be agreed between the two sides before any other agreements could be reached.

“Switzerland wants new access agreements to the common market. But this will only be possible if the institutional issues are resolved. You can’t build a house if the foundations are unstable,” he said.