US President Donald Trump’s tariff war has reignited a long-standing debate in Switzerland: whether it should inch closer to the EU, its largest trading partner.
Swiss president Karin Keller-Sutter will on Friday join EU finance ministers meeting in Warsaw, the first time the Alpine nation has done so. Keller-Sutter, who is also the country’s finance minister, told local press this week that Switzerland wanted to “stabilise, deepen relations with the EU”.
The British chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is also set to attend and call on the UK and EU to work closely together on defence financing to provide greater economic and national security.
Export-oriented Switzerland was shocked to find itself among the countries facing the highest “reciprocal tariffs” announced by President Donald Trump this month — 31 per cent, nearly as much as China at 34 per cent.
After the US announcement the Swiss president said she was in close contact with EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen. Switzerland chose not to retaliate and Keller-Sutter had a phone call with Trump on Wednesday just hours before he reversed course and paused the tariffs.
Keller-Sutter’s visit to Warsaw comes after Switzerland and the EU signed a historic agreement late last year, pledging to overhaul their joint trading relationship after 10 years of difficult negotiations.
The details of the package, which covers a broad array of policies from freedom of movement to dispute settlement and food safety, are expected in June. It will have to be put to the Swiss public in a referendum before coming into force.
Posted by John3262005
1 Comment
I’ve lived and worked in Switzerland as an EU and American National. They are as close to a police state as one can come west of Hungary and have always been ruthless and vicious enforcing Schengen even as a non member state and many subscribe to older fashioned social Darwinism that was beaten out of a Germany in the post war era. The middle class have it fantastically there as far as quality of material life, but there are darker forces there that ensure that it serves as a retreat and tax haven for the rich, even the criminal rich.