The biggest leak of TTIP documents yet: more than 100 confidential papers | Hacker News Reader

The biggest leak of TTIP documents yet: more than 100 confidential papers

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108 pointsrendx18 comments

Proposal to make it easier for US professionals to work in the EU and vice-versa: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2162296-14-10-07-eu-...

Don't know what "confidential papers" means but TTIP documents are published regularly (e.g. http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=1230 ) but seemingly not many people are interested in them.

From this page:

> The European Commission is negotiating TTIP as openly as possible.

> A final agreement would have 24 chapters, grouped together in 3 parts:

> - Market access

> - Regulatory cooperation

> - Rules

> And as part of our latest transparency initiative, we're publishing:

> - new 2-page factsheets, in plain language

> - negotiating texts we've given US negotiators:

> - - EU textual proposals on parts 2 and 3 of the TTIP – these set out how we'd want a final deal to read, line by line

> - - EU position papers – what we want to achieve in a chapter.

> We will publish further texts as they become available.

> We will make the whole text of the agreement public once negotiations have been concluded – well in advance of its signature and ratification.

Sure seems like they're trying to open this up... wonder what the leak is about then?

Saying that they're trying to open this up is like saying a fat person is on a diet because they've switched from regular cola to diet cola.

It doesn't make a dent unless they also exercise more and eat less.

It is so ridiculous that we allow these people to play masters of the universe, with little or no accountability or transparency.

We shouldn't settle for scraps.

My off-the-cuff reaction is the same as yours but look what happens to institutions where all negotiation is public: posturing, media tyranny, corridor diplomacy and a huge gap between public position and any real opinion.

Transparency has a cost also.

Direct links to documents: http://pastebin.com/fA7z2BPi

(pastebin since HN wouldn't let me post the full link list as a comment)

Download them all with wget:

wget -O - "http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=fA7z2BPi" | wge -i -

TTIP: Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership- a secret deal between US and EU

It's correct that much of the details are secret, but I'd stay it's still more correct to label it as a free-trade agreement than a 'secret deal'.

I think it's insane that negotiations aren't public, and I also disagree with some of the contents being discussed. But I think it's more objectively described as a free-trade agreement (in which there are also a lot of good parts).

That's a fair point, but since we are all pissed off at our governments for taking liberties with our well-intentioned permission to conduct espionage on behalf of our well-being, your are extending more benefit-of-the-doubt than a lot of us are. That's probably to your credit. But I am wary that the 'secret' stuff has a lot of implications that are only on the edge of what we would think of as trade agreement- intel sharing and such.

It could, I suppose, be a positive: everybody come clean about the past(keep that stuff a secret) and then have fair and reasonable limitations going forward. There was a day when I thought like that... :)

The negotiations do not need to be public - as noted elsewhere opening them up would also come with a cost. International agreements like this are often negotiated behind closed doors.

What is a problem, is we can be sure that once the negotiations are complete and the agreement brought before the legislature for approval (essentially a rubber stamp as we already know), there will be very little time for debate and public comment before this shit sandwich is rammed down our throats. That's the really undemocratic part.

With that in mind these leaks are a great thing and entirely appropriate

Does anyone know credentials of the people negotiating these deals? Are they well-paid?

If these deals' negotiations have to be secret and since so much is at stake, I'd hope my government would have the best negotiators, psychologists, economists, spies, or other personnel that money can buy.

This is some of the European side (European Commissioner for Trade): http://ec.europa.eu/commission/2014-2019/malmstrom/team_en

Regularly paid EU-officials. I think they are generally hard-working and well-qualified people.

Based on ExpiredLink's comment elsewhere in this thread, it doesn't seem like the deal is secret at all? Here's the EU page on it: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=1230

I some parts are still held secret; this is only the EU-side, I think the US are still keeping their citizens in the dark; and EU only started publishing some details after heavy criticism, it should have been transparent from the beginning.

And the EU side decided that all ISDS trials have to be done at a court that is staffed with judges from both contract partners and rules in public.

Needs a mirror

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