Macri pressured Uruguay to announce Mercosur-EU deal because he wanted “electoral achievement”

In July 2019, the government of Mauricio Macri the euphoria announced European Union-Mercosur AgreementHowever, little progress has been made since then and now Uruguayan Minister of Foreign Affairs, Francisco Bustillo, said the closing of negotiations partly responds to the pressures of the former Argentine president since necessary to show success in the electoral campaign in Argentina.

The head of Uruguayan diplomacy spoke in the Chamber of Deputies before the Committee on International Affairs, where, according to the Uruguayan portal Weekly search and could to confirm PROFILE through a legislator who participates in the commission, Francisco Bustillo stated that in fact the the agreement with the European Union is not closed and put as an argument to advanced the announcement the closure of negotiations due to the urgency that the Argentine government had to Mauricio Macri for show this achievement ahead of the 2019 presidential elections.

Macri, on the Mercosur-EU agreement: “We were the third most isolated country in the world”

In this way, the Minister of External Relations affirmed that the free trade treaty which has been negotiated for 20 years “it’s not closed, the central body of the same is agreed, but there are four or five very important topics left“which prevent its ratification.

In this sense, he explained that an agreement has not yet been reached on the ethanol, geographical indications and even aspects related to legal issues and translation of documents, reported The country of Uruguay. As he could know PROFILE, another of the arguments put forward by the Chancellor was that Europeans are concerned about the environmental theme due to the fires suffered by the Amazon lately, the politics of Jair Bolsonaro on this aspect. Bustillo added that I did not see possible the agreement to be finalized in 2021.

After the words of the Chancellor, the opposition deputy of the Popular Participation Movement (MPP) – Large Front, Daniel Caggiani, the statements caught his attention and questioned him since the European Union-Mercosur agreement is one of the priorities of the foreign policy of Luis Lacalle Pou. “We are concerned about the little progress and the current impossibility of signing the European Union-Mercosur agreement”, declared on his social networks the legislator who chairs the committee on international affairs of the House of Representatives.

European Union demands environmental guarantees from Mercosur to ratify free trade agreement

“Mr President, I congratulate you; during your presidency … twenty years of negotiations have been accomplished: we have a Mercosur-European Union agreement“was the sentence that on June 28, 2019, the Chancellor Jorge Faurie said he was delighted to announce Macri the agreement. However, the deal appears to have been stalled as stated by Francisco Bustillo, who has good relations with the current Argentine president, Alberto Fernandez.

The Uruguayan Minister of Foreign Affairs since July 2020 is a “personal friend” by Fernández. They are known because Bustillo was an ambassador in Argentina between 2005 and 2010, when Alberto was chief of staff. The friendship continued and the former Uruguayan Ambassador to Spain received Fernández there on several occasions, such as during Fernández’s tour of Madrid while he was a presidential candidate and they also met during the first official trip to Spain. Even Bustillo was one of the guests at Fernández’s first dinner at Olivos.

EuDr / MC