TTIP Leaks: Secret TTIP documents for download

Today at 11 a.m. Greenpeace Nederland published parts of the secret TTIP negotiating texts, at the same time Greenpeace experts are posting the content on the re: publish in front. The leaked documents show that TTIP could massively undermine environmental and consumer standards. This contract must never never come into force!

"Trade agreements with such far-reaching influence must be discussed publicly and negotiated transparently," explains Jürgen Knirsch, an expert on trade at Greenpeace. "Anything else is undemocratic and a threat to the achievements of civil society." Knirsch thus provides the explanation for the publication of the previously secret TTIP negotiation papers. Because although in Europe alone more than half a billion people will feel the effects, the negotiations between the USA and the EU have so far been a single black box for the population. In Germany, for example, the negotiation text is in two monitored reading rooms in the Ministry of Commerce and in the US Embassy. The public has no access. Only the members of the Bundestag, the Bundesrat and selected employees of federal ministries are allowed to look at the papers - for two hours, under supervision. And even that only since the beginning of this year as a reaction to the massive protests by TTIP opponents. What is in it must not leave the room: neither as a copy nor as the spoken word - there is absolute confidentiality.

After all, the world's largest trade agreement is to be created with TTIP. Now there is finally a bit of transparency in the negotiations - if not at the initiative of the negotiators. Greenpeace Netherlands publishes the previously largely secret negotiating texts. With almost 13 pages, the 250 chapters represent around half of the entire agreement and show the status before the 13th round of negotiations that was concluded last week. And in fact, the texts confirm all fears: The trade agreement massively interferes with European regulations for the protection of the environment and consumers - more than previously assumed. It tries to abolish the precautionary principle in force in Europe, which only allows products if they are harmless to humans and the environment. Instead, there is a threat of the introduction of the risk principle applied in the USA. This works exactly the other way around: First of all, everything can be permitted - unless the harmfulness of a product has been clearly proven. So it is not surprising that more than 170 GM plants are approved for cultivation in the USA, and only one in Europe. The European precautionary principle is no longer mentioned anywhere in the TTIP text. It fits in with the fact that the American agricultural industry is increasingly scourging the precautionary principle as a trade barrier. If the USA prevails, the TTIP could push GM crops that have previously been banned in Europe or other controversial products such as meat produced with growth accelerators onto the local market.

In addition, an initial analysis of the documents confirms a number of other critical points. Advanced EU environmental laws on food safety or chemicals are in danger of being weakened or scrapped altogether. Industry representatives are given a central say in important decisions, while the interests of civil society are not taken into account. As things stand at present, the planned mutual adjustment of legislation between the USA and the EU would be based on the lowest common denominator. European laws such as food labeling or cosmetics would be threatened. “What has been made public so far from these secret negotiations has sounded like a nightmare. Now we know that this could very soon become reality,” says Knirsch. «TTIP shakes the foundations of European environmental and consumer protection. The agreement threatens rights and laws that have been hard won over decades. This contract must not come into force."

Download the documents at TTIP leaks or the Pirate Party Switzerland.