Trump's trade war introducing unilateral trade tariffs violates treaty
Terminating the Trade Treaty between the US, Mexico and Canada, as Trump intends, violates the treaty and also has implications for labour law, says emeritus professor of international labour law, Paul van der Heijden, in Dutch newspaper ‘Het Financieele Dagblad’.
President-elect Donald Trump will use trade policy as a powerful tool to promote US interests. After targeting China, neighbouring countries Mexico and Canada are also in line.
The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), which is separate from the World Trade Organization (WTO), contains an important chapter on fundamental labour rights, such as the right to free trade unions, says Van der Heijden. The professor emeritus is a member of the arbitration panel of the USMCA, and calls Trump's tactics a ‘pre-emptive strike’. It gives the US a head start in negotiating changes to the treaty. ‘He's also bringing in all sorts of issues that are not in the USMCA, such as illegal migration. That's something on which he was re-elected so he’s piling on the pressure there.'
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Read the full article (in Dutch) in FD
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