Airbus subsidies: WTO sets up new panel after EU demand

The European Union obtained the establishment of a new panel of experts from the World Trade Organization (WTO) on August 27, 2018, to settle the 14-year-old trade dispute with the United States over European subsidies granted to Airbus.

Image : WTO

The panel will now weigh if the European Union complied with the ruling of the WTO in May 2018, when the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) concluded that the EU failed to stop subsidies for both the A380 and A350 programs.

The request was initially made at a previous meeting on August 15, 2018, but blocked by the United States. “As we sit here today, the EU and these four member states [United Kingdom, France, Germany and Spain] still have not provided even the most basic information about alleged amendments made to certain launch aid contracts,” the U.S. delegation was reported saying by Reuters. The EU, however, claims it withdrew any remaining subsidies. Its request for a panel was automatically accepted at the second meeting in accordance to the rules of the WTO. The conclusion of the panel should be known in several months.

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Regardless of the conclusion, the EU could still face trade sanctions, as requested by the United States to the WTO on July 20, 2018. Boeing values the sanctions at several billions dollars a year.