Trade negotiations with Malaysia

28.9.2017

Question for written answer E-006080-17
to the Commission
Rule 130
Inmaculada Rodríguez-Piñero Fernández (S&D) , Elena Valenciano (S&D)

In 2010, the EU opened negotiations with Malaysia with a view to concluding a ‘broad and comprehensive’ free trade agreement. Although the negotiations were suspended in 2012, in March 2017 in Singapore Commissioner Malmström announced that she had arranged talks with the Malaysian authorities on reopening them.

However, reports from organisations such as Amnesty International or the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (SUHAKAM) make it clear that Malaysia is continuing to perpetrate human rights violations which include arbitrary detention, acts of torture, the deportation of political and human rights activists, violent clampdowns on freedom of expression and association and the right to hold peaceful meetings and the imposition of the death penalty for drug trafficking or murder.

Against this background of political repression — which has been stepped up following the recent entry into force of the law on national security — the former opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim has been imprisoned since 2015 on charges of sodomy.

1. In the light of the current situation regarding human rights and fundamental freedoms in Malaysia, does the Commission regard the reopening of trade negotiations as appropriate?

2. Has the Commission arranged any kind of formal dialogue with the Malaysian Government on the human rights situation in the country?