EU Member States agree ‘anti-coercion negotiating position’
The EU said, 16 November, that Member States had ‘agreed today their negotiating position (mandate) on a regulation on the protection of the Union and its Member States from economic coercion by third countries (Anti-Coercion Instrument – ACI).’
It said that the ‘new instrument in the EU’s toolbox of autonomous instruments [would have] the aim of deterring third countries from targeting the EU and its Member States with deliberate economic coercion [and] allow the EU to defend itself better on the global stage through a large variety of response measures.’
According to a 2021 EU Parliament legislative proposal, such a regulation would apply where a third country ‘interferes in the legitimate sovereign choices of the Union or a Member State by seeking to prevent or obtain the cessation, modification or adoption of a particular act by the Union or a Member State, by applying or threatening to apply measures affecting trade or investment.’
Some economists have argued that the use of secondary sanctions – e.g., cutting off economic actors from, for example, US markets – represents a form of economic coercion.
‘Proportional and on retroactive’
The 16 November document says that ‘among the measures that could be applied to the third country as a response to economic coercion are imposition of trade restrictions, for example in the form of increased customs duties, import or export licences, or restrictions in the field of services, public procurement or foreign direct investment. These measures would be applied without a retroactive character and respecting the proportionality with regards to the damage caused…Any countermeasures taken by the EU would be applied only as a last resort when there is no other way to address economic intimidation.’
