The approval of the European American trade agreement has reached a deadlock, and the European Parliament is seeking to join the safeguard mechanism

Brussels, May 7th (Xinhua) - According to European media reports on the 7th, the trade agreement reached between the European Union and the United States last year has been deadlocked in the internal approval process of the EU. The European Parliament opposes hasty approval of the agreement, stating that the threats from the US Trump administration and the "repeated jumping" stance make the agreement's safeguard mechanism even more necessary.

European news channel reported that representatives from the European Parliament, European Commission, and European Council held a six hour trilateral consultation on the implementation of the EU-US trade agreement on the evening of the 6th. Despite the European Commission stating that there has been "progress" in the negotiations, no breakthrough has been reached by all parties, and the next round of negotiations is scheduled for May 19th.

Michael Damianos, Minister of Energy, Commerce and Industry of Cyprus, which holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, stated that all parties are committed to advancing the implementation of the European Union trade agreement as soon as possible and continuing to cooperate with the European Parliament. He emphasized that the negotiation goal is to seek a "successful and balanced outcome" for European companies.

The European Union and the United States reached a trade agreement in July 2025. Due to tensions between the two sides over the United States' demand for Denmark's autonomous territory of Greenland and the US Supreme Court's ruling that the Trump administration's large-scale tariff policies are illegal, the EU's approval of the agreement has been delayed for several months.

On May 7th, US President Trump posted on social media that if the EU fails to fulfill the trade agreement by July 4th, tariffs on EU products imported to the US will immediately jump to higher levels.

The European Commission and the majority of EU member states hope to approve the agreement as soon as possible in order to provide certainty for businesses. However, members of multiple political groups within the European Parliament have refused to hastily release the agreement without a safeguard mechanism, demanding the inclusion of multiple safeguard clauses in the agreement to address potential new tariff measures or other unilateral actions by the United States in the future. These safeguard clauses include protecting the interests of the European Union in the event of a US violation of the agreement or imposition of new tariffs, setting suspension clauses so that the EU can immediately freeze the agreement in the event of a US threat to EU territorial integrity, and so on.

European Parliament members voted on March 26th to support the conditional implementation of the European American trade agreement. On May 5th, the European Commission urged the United States to implement the main provisions of the agreement as soon as possible before the one-year anniversary of its signing at the end of July.