The president of the United States, Joe Biden, will receive the president of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen, in Washington on Friday to discuss support for Ukraine and investments in clean technologies, among other topics, according to the White House.
At this bilateral meeting, the two leaders “will review the strong cooperation between the United States (US) and the European Union (EU) to support Ukraine in defending Ukraine’s sovereignty and democracy, and impose costs on Russia for its aggression,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.
Biden and Von der Leyen will also discuss coordination between the US and the EU to combat the climate crisis, through investment in ‘clean’ technologies and will take the opportunity to take stock of the joint task force for energy security. in Europe, established a year ago to help the EU reduce its dependence on Russian fossil fuels and speed up its ‘green’ transition.
International security challenges, including the joint work between the US and the EU to “address the challenges posed by China”, will also be highlighted at this meeting, according to Jean-Pierre.
According to the Politico news website, US officials have been urging close allies to impose unprecedented sanctions on China if Beijing provides military support to Russia in the war against Kiev.
This came after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Chinese companies were already providing “non-lethal support” to Russia, with new information suggesting that Beijing could provide “lethal support”.
The leader of the community executive began a trip to North America on Monday, beginning with Canada, where she met with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and heading to the United States, in what will be her second meeting with Joe Biden at the White House since that the Democrat replaced Donald Trump in 2021.
In recent months, transatlantic relations have been marked by European discontent with the US plan to subsidize the local production of ‘clean’ technologies with 370,000 million dollars (about 350,000 million euros), which is considered discriminatory, Contrary to the rules of the world. Commercial Organization.
Together with the escalation of energy prices, the North American plan threatens to lead European companies to leave the continent for other regions to establish their productive base.
The North American Inflation Reduction Act, which took effect in August of last year, aims to reduce costs for Americans, including, for example, investments in the energy sector and subsidies for electric vehicles, batteries and renewable energy projects.
However, many of these subsidies only include products made in the United States. Since then, Brussels has started negotiations with Washington with the aim of achieving favorable treatment for European companies, in line with what Mexican and Canadian companies will receive, but there has still been no agreement, despite the fact that in recent days both sides have acknowledged progress.
Given the lack of guarantees from the United States, the EU is working on its own plan to encourage European ‘clean’ technologies, a proposal that the European Commission plans to finalize in the middle of this month and which should contain rules to improve the supply of critical raw materials and increase the manufacture of technologies on European soil, as well as a reform of the electricity market, which is considered essential to lower prices.
Source: TSF
