European Union member states yesterday approved a Sino-EU textile agreement to release embargoed Chinese textiles, paving the way for the backlog of 87.5 million items to be cleared next week.
The meeting in Brussels ratified an agreement struck on Monday in Beijing between EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson and Chinese commerce minister Bo Xilai.
None of the 25 EU member states voted against the agreement, an EU official said yesterday. 'This is the final green light.'
The deal would be codified in legislation, which would be quickly adopted by the European Commission, he added. 'It will be possible to unblock the goods in the middle of next week.'
The goods stuck at European ports or in transit had exceeded this year's quotas under an agreement signed on June 10, which placed limitations on 10 categories of Chinese textile products for export to the EU until the end of 2007.
Under Monday's agreement, all the 87.5 million mainland textile items would be admitted into the EU, with half of them not counted against the quota limits of June 10 and the other half counted against quotas for next year and unused categories.