ABSTRACT
The EPA negotiations, in implementing the Cotonou requirements and making trade relations compatible with WTO norms, are meant to build new agreements between the EU and the ACP states. The binding nature of WTO law on European trade policy renders the EPA positions of the EU strongly conditioned by external factors. Nevertheless, WTO law is sufficiently ambiguous to provide its members with broad room for interpretation. As in the case of peacekeeping, EU actors thus have room to interpret international trade law and select the instruments they feel are best able to promote it.
