Ramallah, 13 September 2012 - On 18 September 2012, the committee of International Trade (INTA) of the European Parliament will vote on the ACAA or ‘the protocol on Conformity Assessment and Acceptance of Industrial Products’, which is a protocol attached to the European Union/Israel Association Agreement.
The EU/Israel Association Agreement forms the legal basis for trade relations between the EU and Israel, which gives Israel preferential treatment with the EU. However, Article 2 states that the agreement should be based on ‘respect for human rights and democratic principles, which guides their internal and international policy and constitutes an essential element of this agreement’.
The EU has become Israel’s biggest importer — 16.8 billion Euros in 2011 — and the EU become the second largest market for Israeli exports — 12.6 billion Euros in 2011. Addameer believes that the European Parliament should suspend its vote on the ACAA protocol until Israel complies with several fundamental international humanitarian law and human rights law standards, related both to the human rights situation inside Israel and Israel’s obligations towards Palestinians living in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT).
Indeed, Addameer believes that the protocol contains serious legal deficiencies that have not been resolved by the Commission relating to the geographical implementation of this agreement (in particular regarding the settlements) and it is an important precedent for other agreements that need the assent vote of the European parliament.
Although the EU decided to freeze upgrades with Israel in June 2009, it has continued to sign agreements with Israel. For example, in July 2012, the EU offered (without consultation of the European Parliament) to implement 60 new activities of cooperation in 15 different fields —based on the current Action Plan — to be implemented in the short and medium term.
None of these activities are conditioned to any progress in Israel’s human rights record. While certain activities will be implemented without the assent of the European Parliament (EP), others might need to go through the EP for its assent vote. A positive vote on ACAA will jeopardise any possibility to block further EU-Israel agreements going through the EP.
Addameer therefore calls on all members of Palestinian, European and international civil society to urgently act to prevent the protocol from passing and encourage people to write, using the template letter provided, to the appropriate Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), for whom there is an attached list.
In order to act, you will also find attached a toolkit containing:
- A background briefing on ACAA, explaining everything about the history, the context and the timeline of the vote,
- A template letter to write to MEPs on the ACAA protocol (Annex I),
- A table with the position of the MEPs member of the international trade committee on ACAA,
- An update on the Israeli violations of IHL and human rights law in Israel and the OPT.