Abe to Meet with EU Leaders in Brussels on March 21: EU Official

Brussels, March 9 (Jiji Press)--European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said Thursday that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will visit Brussels on March 21 to meet with European Union leaders. At the meeting, Abe and the EU leaders, including EU Council President Donald Tusk, are likely to reaffirm their determination to conclude a Japan-EU economic partnership agreement at an early date, on which negotiations have been in deadlock, people familiar with the matter said. The EU will do everything to bring the EPA talks to a successful end, Juncker told a press conference. He also stressed that Europe is attaching importance on rule-based free trade at a time when protectionism is rising. Abe's visit to Brussels will be part of his planned European tour starting March 19, which also covers France, Germany and Italy. In a related development in the Belgian capital on Thursday, the EU held a summit and sounded an alarm against protectionist trade policies. A document issued later to wrap up summit discussions said that among free trade negotiations the EU is undertaking, the EPA talks with Japan could be the first to yield an agreement. END