Strasbourg - The European Union (EU) will review a contested investor dispute mechanism in its free trade negotiations with the United States, the bloc's executive announced Tuesday, after analysing almost 150 000 responses to a public consultation.
If approved, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) would create the world's largest free trade zone and possibly help revive the EU's flagging economy. But the deal has faced criticism and progress has been slow.
Negotiations over the so-called Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) clause were suspended last year. An EU-wide online survey was organized after consumer groups raised concerns that it could be abused by corporations to block undesirable regulations.
Critics have, for example, pointed to a lawsuit that the tobacco giant Philip Morris brought against Australia over rules on plain cigarette packaging.
"The consultation clearly shows that there is a huge scepticism against the ISDS instrument," said EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom, adding that an "open and frank" discussion is needed with governments, lawmakers and civil society before taking any decisions.
It was unclear Tuesday when ISDS negotiations with Washington might resume.
"This is a clear message: citizens, trade unions, local and regional governments and small and medium-sized companies do not want special courts for corporations to bring cases against individual sovereign states," said EU lawmaker Helmut Scholz of the far-left GUE/NGL group.
But conservative EU lawmakers Godelieve Quisthoudt-Rowohl and Daniel Caspary said it was important to "find the right balance between protecting investors and safeguarding the EU's right and ability to regulate."
Malmstrom pointed out that individual member states already have around 1 400 investor protection agreements with countries around the world, adding that many of these are old and provide lower levels of guarantees than are foreseen in the TTIP negotiations.
Governments on both sides of the Atlantic have agreed to include an ISDS clause in the EU-US free trade agreement, she added.