Swiss seek Italian backing in EU talks

Pascal Couchepin intends to get Berlusconi's measure Keystone Archive

Switzerland is hoping to win Italy’s support to wrap up a second round of bilateral negotiations with the European Union.

The Swiss president, Pascal Couchepin, is due to hold talks in Rome with the current EU president, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Couchepin will also meet the Pope.

On Monday Couchepin will have an audience with Pope John Paul II, who is expected to visit Switzerland next year.

The main point of Couchepin’s visit is his meeting on Tuesday with Berlusconi. A key issue will be the question of how to tackle tax fraud – one of the main sticking points hindering progress of a series of ten bilateral accords designed to strengthen ties between Bern and Brussels.

Switzerland and Italy have clashed on a number of occasions over the issue, with Swiss banking secrecy the main bone of contention.

It is also a key stumbling block to Switzerland joining the Schengen and Dublin agreements on crime and asylum.

Bern has been negotiating with the EU to become an associate member to both treaties since July 2002.

Delicate timing

The meeting between Couchepin and Berlusconi comes just days after EU ministers failed to agree on a compromise deal put forward by Greece, which held the last six-month presidency.

“We’re at a delicate stage [of the negotiations] as we’re on the verge of agreeing on the second round of bilaterals,” said Alexis Lautenberg, the Swiss ambassador to Rome.

“But a change in the EU presidency is a good occasion [for Couchepin] to assess whether priorities [within the EU] have changed,” he told swissinfo.

The Swiss want the negotiations wrapped up as soon as possible in case there is a referendum in Switzerland on accepting the agreements, which would delay implementation.

Mixed expectations

Monique Jametti Greiner, who has been heading the Swiss negotiating team, believes the row over taxation should not taint any relations with the EU – or Italy.

“Italy has to comply with the demands of the member states,” she told swissinfo. “I’m sure the Italians will do a good job leading the EU.”

But not everyone shares this optimism.

“I think there won’t be any progress on the bilaterals during the second half of this year,” said Maximilian Reimann of the rightwing Swiss People’s Party.

According to Reimann, Italy has “little understanding” of Swiss interests.

He said Italian Finance Minister Giulio Tremonti was living proof of this, obsessed with the notion that banking secrecy was a way of protecting organised crime.

Tunnel vision

Relations between Italy and Switzerland have also been tested by Swiss traffic safety measures imposed at Gotthard tunnel – the main north-south axis through the Swiss Alps – after a deadly fire in 2001.

A staggered entry system for trucks has been challenged by Rome, which argues that the measures contravene the first set of Swiss-EU bilaterals already in force.

“It’s a serious problem for Italy,” says Lautenberg. “But I think Switzerland is making lots of efforts in improving traffic flow in the Alps.”

“I even think that the Italians may come to see that the staggered entry system doesn’t block the flow of traffic and they might even one day impose it in the Mont Blanc tunnel.”

swissinfo, Vanessa Mock

In brief

The Swiss president, Pascal Couchepin, is travelling to Rome this week for talks with the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, currently president of the EU.

One of the topics of discussion is likely to be how to wrap up negotiations over ten agreements between Bern and Brussels, governing issues such as cross-border fraud and asylum.

The Swiss are in a hurry because a referendum may be required before the accords can be implemented.