From today’s Open Europe news summary:
France rejects last-minute offer to break deadlock over EU-US trade talks
EU trade ministers will today discuss the European Commission’s mandate to negotiate a free-trade deal with the US. France is threatening to veto the launch of EU-US trade talks unless the audio-visual industry is completely excluded. In a bid to break the deadlock, the European Commission and the Irish EU Presidency have proposed asking EU member states to give unanimous approval to any parts of the draft agreement affecting the audio-visual industry once the negotiations on that specific sector are concluded. However, Le Figaro quotes a source from the office of French Trade Minister Nicole Bricq as saying, “We already have a veto on the conclusion of the agreement, so [the offer] doesn’t change anything for us.”