States and EU urged to withdraw from negotiations on Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership and Trans-Pacific Partnership
23 December 2013: FIAN International launched a letter action addressing the EU, the USA and a number of countries negotiating directly or indirectly the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
The letter action is open and invites for participation (see template letter below).
It raises grave concerns about the TTIP and TPP initiatives both for procedure and content: These initiatives are being pushed through with unacceptable secrecy and lack of public scrutiny. They aim at tying States' hands and preventing them from meeting their obligations under human rights law. They would allow corporations to escape necessary regulation and they would limit the regulatory space of States for protecting and fulfilling human rights. Altogether the agreements are seen as undermining the rule of law.
The letter action points out that almost all States would violate human rights treaty law, if they became (directly or indirectly) parties to these agreements. The human rights analysis concludes that the agreements conflict with the UN Charter and must not be applied. TTIP and TPP even ignore peremptory norms of international law. Therefore they are void.
States and the EU are urged to withdraw from these negotiations and to engage in a worldwide transparent political process towards a new global investment and trade regime in line with international law, human rights and public interest.