Australia Set to Finalise Trade Deal with EU

According to the latest reports, Dan Tehan, Australian trade minister, stated that he would most likely go through with a free trade agreement with the European Union by the end of 2022. This particular news comes as a shock because of EU’s anger over Canberra’s cancellation of a submarine contract with France. Nevertheless, Brussels had ultimately postponed the last round of discussions, which was supposed to be held on the 12th of October. This decision was made in solidarity with France after Australia had cancelled the multi-billion dollar deal that France believed to be the cornerstone of its Indo-Pacific policy.

Moreover, according to reports, instead, it secretly negotiated to build at least eight nuclear-powered submarines with the U.S. and British technology as part of a trilateral security pact between the three countries announced last month. Furthermore, Tehan, in Italy for a meeting of the group of 20 developed countries, told Reuters in an interview he was not concerned by the delay in the talks, and reaching an agreement was strongly in the interests of both sides.

When the Minister was asked when he expected the deal would be they will be looking towards the end of next year to conclude negotiations. The minister believes that they are in very good discussions with the latter nation. Moreover, according to him, the most important thing is that they sit down so Australia can fully explain the decision they took because it was in the national interest. Therefore, it seems that Australia will be conducting this deal with France in the near future.