A spokesperson on agriculture and trade for the European Commission has told the Irish Farmers Journal that the trade offer documents from both political blocs were not public.

This is despite the fact that EU trade commissioner Cecilia Malmström had previously told MEPs that the offer from the EU would be "shared" once the EU received the Mercosur offer.

TTIP precedent

In the case of negotiations between the EU and the US on the proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), MEPs have had access to negotiating documents but are sworn to secrecy on their contents. Little was known about the details of TTIP talks until documents were leaked through the NGO Greenpeace last week.

Malmström tweeted on Wednesday that the first exchange of offers between Mercosur and the EU since 2004 had been made.

A statement from the European Commission later added that both sides will now examine the offers in more detail.

"The EU and Mercosur will hold a chief negotiators' meeting before the summer break in order to take stock of the negotiation and to prepare a schedule of meetings for the second semester of the year," the statement said.

Hogan assurances

Although EU agriculture commissioner Phil Hogan has publicly stated on more than one occasion that the 78,000 tariff-rate quota originally being offered to Mercosur countries had been taken off the table, the privacy surrounding the offers means there can be no proof of this until such time as the Commission chooses to make the content of the offers available to MEPs or to the public.

Moreover, speaking before the European Parliament on Tuesday, Malmström refused to confirm whether beef had been taken out of the negotiations.

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