Talks called off as Turkey's EU bid loses momentum

SWISS WARNING

The national ministers for foreign or European affairs will give notice to Switzerland that its current relationship with the EU has become unsustainable. A draft statement to be adopted on Tuesday (14 December) accuses Switzerland of “incoherent” application of existing agreements and of introducing “legislative measures and practices incompatible with those agreements”.
Swiss voters in 1992 rejected membership of the European Economic Area (EEA), which links Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway to the EU's internal market. Switzerland then negotiated a series of sectoral bilateral agreements with the EU, for example on the free movement of persons. In their statement, the foreign ministers note that this approach “has turned... into a highly complex set of multiple agreements”. “This approach does not ensure the necessary homogeneity in the parts of the internal market and of the EU policies in which Switzerland participates,” the statement says. “This has resulted in legal uncertainty for authorities, operators and individual citizens.”
The statement also criticises the corporate tax rates of some Swiss cantons, which the EU considers to constitute a form of illegal state aid.
The two sides have set up a working group on institutional questions that is to study options for the development of the relationship. No major political party in Switzerland is pushing for the country to join the EU.