Jérôme Bellion-Jourdan, EU representative, insisted at the opening of negotiations on Monday on the fact that discussions should not be focused on transnational corporations, which delayed the beginning of the negotiations about the contents to be included in the future treaty.

The Global Campaign to Dismantle Corporate Power, which gathers hundreds of social movements and organizations around the globe that are pressuring for a UN binding treaty, denounced that the EU is seeking to weaken the scope and focus of the potential treaty in order to protect the interests of transnational corporations.

In an interview with Real World Radio, environmental activist Anne van Schaik, of Friends of the Earth Europe, talked about her position regarding the EU´s behavior in the negotiations. Meanwhile, French activist Juliette Renaud, of Friends of the Earth France, also made reference to the importance of ensuring that transnational corporations, and all their chains of value in the different parts of the world, can be taken to justice in the framework of the future treaty.

Renaud highlighted the support that could be provided in this way by the new French law passed in February by Parliament which forces the parent companies of transnational corporations and their subsidiaries along the supply chain to respond for their human rights violations and environmental damage.