On Jan. 17 in Paraguay, top officials from the European Union, and Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay) signed the EU-Mercosur Free Trade Agreement, in the works for 25 years. The deal, which creates the biggest “free” (rigged) trade bloc in the world, with 730 million people, can go into only partial, “provisional” effect, until the European Parliament and national bodies in the 27 nation-member EU approve it. This could take years or months, depending on lawmakers, and also, whether the pact’s measures are contested in courts.
Representing the EU in Asunción were Antonio Costa, President of the European Council, and Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission. Argentine President Javier Milei attended. Brazil’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Mauro Viera represented his nation. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva did not attend, but had met the day before in Brazil with von der Leyen. Uruguay’s President Yamandu Orsi and Paraguay’s President Santiago Peña attended.
In essence the new pact reduces or eliminates tariff barriers for cartels of transnational corporations of the Western financial complex to dominate physical production and trade of all kinds. Geopolitical commentators are spinning the deal as a coup against Washington’s Donald “Tariff-man” Trump, and against China’s world trade position. But in fact, the deal is a sign of the West’s further destruction of its own national sovereign economic development.
