Mexico

SIXTEEN top shipowners are facing a renewed challenge to their agreement on rates and services for containerised cargo in the north Atlantic.

IT IS finally out in the open. EU governments do not want free trade zones with every nation on the globe.

AS it prepares for the Intergovernmental Conference next month, the European Commission is marshalling its defences against any attempt to weaken its powers.

SOUTH Africans will have to continue waiting for the start of trade negotiations with the EU after foreign ministers refused to give the Commission permission to open talks with Pretoria on a free trade agreement. Ministers said the Commission had not proven whether the agreement would respect the rules of the World Trading Organisation (WTO). But diplomats said they wanted to begin negotiations on stepping up ties with South Africa soon and expressed the hope that the Commission would provide enough details to allow foreign ministers to agree to negotiations when they next meet on 25 March.

THE summit conclusions ended with an outline plan for the EU in the coming five years “to prepare Europe for the 21st century”. Proposals include carrying out treaty reforms, meeting the single currency timetable, conducting enlargement talks with eastern and southern European applicants, reforming the budget after 1999, and continuing friendly relations with the Union’s big neighbours.

WHEN some of Europe’s top industrialists sit down opposite a handful of their Japanese counterparts next week, much of the talk will be about cooperation and the need for common fronts in setting the industrial and commercial policy agenda in Tokyo and Brussels.

WITH a month to go before a major reunion designed to unite the Mediterranean, the European Union is trying to cement its policy on North Africa and the Middle East.

DETAILED statistics charting trends in health across the European Union are to be gathered under a new programme which has been approved by the Commission. A total of 13.8 million ecu will be spent collecting and pooling information on, among other things, life expectancy, mental health, working and living conditions and disease prevention in member states. The Commission is hoping that the statistics will help the EU focus on priority health areas.

EUROPEAN steel-manufacturers are edging closer to filing a complaint with the European Commission to stop the mounting wave of low-priced imports from Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America.

TALK of a free-trade zone between the United States and the European Union is growing, as is criticism of the idea. However, the focus on trade between the two giant markets may just be a front for patching up cracks which have developed in the joint security wall since the fall of the Soviet Union five years ago.

THE EU faces legal action in the World Trade Organisation (WTO) over its cereals import regime.