Swiss-EU negotiations on ‘last mile’, says Swiss foreign minister

EU Commissioner Sefcovic meets Foreign Minister Cassis in Bern Keystone-SDA

Discussions with the European Union on how to re-forge relations with Switzerland are at an advanced stage, according to Swiss foreign minister Ignazio Cassis.

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Cassis made his comment before a meeting with EU Commission vice-president in Bern on Wednesday.

“We are on the last mile,” said Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis at an unrelated media event in Bern this afternoon. It was a matter of “a joint discussion on how the final points can be clarified”.

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“It is time to take political stock of our ongoing negotiations, as we continue to pursue the common goal of concluding the negotiations by the end of this year,” said an EC spokesperson before the meeting.

The meeting at the Lohn estate in Wabern near Bern will be attended by, among others, the Swiss chief negotiator Patric Franzen and his counterpart, the European chief negotiator Richard Szostak. Cassis will also be accompanied by state secretaries Alexandre Fasel, Helene Budliger Artieda and Christine Schraner-Burgener.

The meeting should actually have taken place in the summer. However, it was then cancelled at short notice because the negotiating positions were apparently still too far apart.

Translated from German by DeepL/mga

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