EU-Mercosur trade deal takes effect provisionally as legal challenge awaits ruling
Key takeaways
- The step does not block provisional application but keeps parliamentary ratification on hold.
- Estimates within the bloc suggest the ruling could come before the end of 2027, after which the agreement would have to be voted on again at the parliamentary level, both in the EU and in the member states.
- The Commission's trade spokesperson, Olof Gill, defended the deal's significance: It is of titanic importance economically, given the powers it involves, he said.
Why this matters: an international story with cross-border implications worth tracking.
A month after the provisional entry into force of the trade agreement between the European Union (EU) and Mercosur, exchanges have been governed since May 1 by the terms agreed upon, while political and legal attention in Brussels centers on the EU Court of Justice, which must rule on the validity of the mechanism chosen to launch the treaty.
The referral to the bloc's top court stemmed from a European Parliament resolution, passed in January by a narrow margin (334 votes in favor and 324 against), requesting an opinion on the agreement's compatibility with the EU treaties. The step does not block provisional application but keeps parliamentary ratification on hold. The European Commission stressed that it is a request for an opinion and not a direct challenge to the agreement's content, and recalled that there are favorable precedents in the court's case law on other large-scale trade treaties.
Estimates within the bloc suggest the ruling could come before the end of 2027, after which the agreement would have to be voted on again at the parliamentary level, both in the EU and in the member states. Senior officials argue that the Council's decision to enable provisional application constitutes institutional backing that is hard to reverse, citing as an example the agreement with Canada (CETA), provisionally in force since 2017.