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Swiss parliamentary committees approve negotiating mandate with US

Parliamentary committees say yes to negotiating mandate with USA
The Senate Foreign Affairs Committee supported the draft presented by the government by 11 votes to zero with three abstentions, committee president Marco Chiesa told the media in Bern on Monday. Keystone-SDA

Following the House of Representatives' Foreign Affairs Committee, the Senate's sister committee is also in favour of the government's negotiating mandate on trade relations with the US.

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The Senate Foreign Affairs Committee supported the draft presented by the government by 11 votes to zero with three abstentions, committee president Marco Chiesa told the media in Bern on Monday.

According to the government, this will now go before the Conference of Cantonal Governments. The mandate will then be finalised.

+ Switzerland and US agree to accelerate tariff talks

At the beginning of April, US President Donald Trump announced a global blanket tariff of 10% on imports into the US. Country-specific additional tariffs are to be added – in Switzerland’s case, 21%.

However, these tariffs were suspended. Following this announcement, members of the government began talks with the US government. Last week, the aim of the negotiations was to find a solution to the trade dispute with the US by July 9.

+ What is a tariff? A quick guide

Translated from German by DeepL/ts

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