US-EU Trade And Technology Council To Discuss Ukraine On Monday - White House

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 05th December, 2022) The third ministerial meeting of the US-EU Trade and Technology Council (TTC) will be held at the campus of the University of Maryland on Monday, the White House informs.

"The co-chairs will discuss major geo-political issues such as US-EU cooperation managing the global economic consequences of Russia's aggression. They will discuss the challenges posed by China's non-market economic policies and practices, as well as economic coercion," a National Security Council (NSC) spokesperson told journalists on Sunday.

Participants will also address issues pertaining to the digital economy, as well as sustainable practices and climate change.

"The Inflation Reduction Act will be part of the range of discussions on trade," the NSC spokesperson said.

A number of new initiatives will be launched at the Monday ministerial meeting, including the Strategic Standards Information (SSI) mechanism, which will help the US and EU to promptly react to common strategic issues; a transatlantic initiative on sustainable trade; and a pilot project on privacy enhancing technologies and synthetic data in health and medicine.

"We have started exchanging information on the market situation of US and EU medical devices companies in China, in order to better understand the impact of China's non-market policies and practices on US and EU companies.

The United States and the European Union are also deepening their exchanges to identify shared concerns relating to China's increasing use of the investment funds," the NSC spokesperson said.

The US-EU Trade and Technology Council (TTC) was established at a US-EU summit in June 2021, by US President Joe Biden, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel. Since then, two TTC ministerial meetings were held - one in September 2021 in Pittsburgh, and the second one in May of this year in Paris.

The Monday ministerial meeting will be attended by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, US Trade Representative Katherine Tai, European Commission Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis, and European Commission Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager, according to the US State Department.

On Friday, Bloomberg reported that European Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton was not going to attend the TTC meeting in Maryland amid EU's trade concerns over the "unfriendly" Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Breton's aide said that Washington neglects to pay attention to the issues related to the European industry and entities.