The European Commission’s talks in Manama this week gave a new lease of life to long-stalled free trade agreement (FTA) negotiations with the Gulf states. With many outstanding issues on the table, from Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) members’ dissatisfaction with the EU’s tariff regime, to the Europeans dissatisfaction with the current rush to sign bilateral FTAs with the US, there was also plenty to talk about.
The annual EU-GCC talks also tackled the issue of reform, both in Bahrain and in other GCC countries, with both sides agreeing that any move for change should come from within, rather than being imposed from the outside.
In this too, the unspecified target for criticism was Washington – yet the US was hardly idle this week, as the Bahrain American Chamber of Commerce received its official launch on April 6, with one of its stated objectives being the speeding up of moves to conclude a US-Bahraini FTA.
