An EU agreement with US President Donald Trump regarding threatening tariffs is unlikely to be concluded in the coming days. This was stated by Irish Minister and head of the Eurogroup of finance ministers Paschal Donohoe, according to UNN, citing The Guardian.
After a summit of finance ministers in Brussels, Donohoe stated: "Our assessment is that negotiations are still ongoing, and we have not yet reached the point where an agreement has been concluded."
"It seems there is another stage of negotiations ahead, and we are very mindful of that in terms of my view on the agreement at the end."
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The publication notes that nervousness and secrecy still surround the proposed agreement in principle.
EU Economy Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis stated that the EU is still working at full capacity on the agreement.
"We were working with this July 9 deadline in mind, but as I already noted, it seems the US has now somewhat shifted this deadline to August 1, so that gives us a little more time, but on our part, we remain focused.
The sooner we can reach an agreement, the better, because it will remove uncertainty around these tariff issues, and we truly see that this affects the economy, as well as companies' investment decisions."
As European capitals begin to weigh the proposals, new opinions are starting to emerge.
Earlier on Tuesday, Swedish Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson called the proposal "really bad," while MEPs gathered in Strasbourg said they would fight against a basic 10% tariff.
At a press briefing, German MEP Bernd Lange stated that if the current tariffs remained, EU exporters would pay 100 billion euros per year to the US treasury compared to the current 7 billion euros.
"This is revenue for the United States budget. And that is unacceptable," he said.
Trump: new tariffs on trade with the US to take effect from August 1 "without delay"08.07.25, 19:11