France insoumise leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon on Sunday called for a debate in the National Assembly on the free-trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosur, “and that it does not apply if the French do not vote for it”..

“Mr. Macron, stop your Mercosur circus. We demand that this treaty be discussed in the National Assembly and that it not be applied if the French do not vote for it.”Jean-Luc Mélenchon urged the French President in an interview on France 3. The Insoumis group of deputies had planned to examine a motion for resolution in its parliamentary niche on November 28, calling on the government to reject the treaty.

The government ruled it out of order on November 5, just as it had ruled out of order a similar motion for a resolution from the RN group in early October. The Chairwoman of the French National Assembly’s Economic Affairs Committee, Aurélie Trouvé (LFI), announced on franceinfo on Saturday that her group would be tabling a new motion for a resolution to call for a debate, under article 50-1 of the Constitution, on the following issues “the National Assembly to vote against this agreement”..

This proposal will be finalized on Monday, she told AFP. The former head of Attac sharply criticized the head of state’s attitude, deeming that “if the agreement is signed, the first person to blame will be President Macron, who for years and years let these negotiations go ahead” and “let us believe that a good treaty would be possible”..

Not “too late

She also felt that France had been too late in trying to organize a European-wide protest against the text. “It might be time to organize a blocking minority”.she asserted. It is “probably late”but not necessarily “too late”to block “the commercial part of the agreement, said the French Socialist Party MP and former French President François Hollande on Radio J.

To do so, at least four EU member states, representing at least 35% of the EU population, must oppose it, he recalled. For her part, LFI MEP Manon Aubry has sent Ursula Von Der Leyen an open letter signed, she claims, by over 130 parliamentarians from 13 countries, calling on the President of the European Commission to abandon the conclusion of the treaty.

“This is the first time that a transnational appeal has been published, demonstrating that what is at stake goes beyond the mere borders of French agriculture.”she told AFP. The missive, published by the newspaper La Tribune on Sunday, also denounces the Commission’s alleged plan to split the agreement in two. “to bypass ratification by national parliaments”..

French farmers plan to mobilize from Monday onwards against this treaty – negotiated for decades between the EU and the Mercosur countries (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia) – which the European Commission, backed by several countries such as Germany and Spain, hopes to sign by the end of the year. The subject is also on the agenda of President Macron’s tour of Latin America, which began on Saturday evening and runs until Thursday.