Switzerland – European Union relations
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The relations between Switzerland and the European Union (EU) are framed by a series of bilateral treaties whereby the Swiss Confederation has adopted various provisions of European Union law in order to participate in the Union's single market.
In February 2014, the Swiss voted in a referendum to introduce quotas for all migrants in Switzerland. Such a quota system would, if implemented, violate the agreement between Switzerland and the European Union on the free movement of persons, and so terminate all the various bilateral agreements between Switzerland and the European Union.
The European Union is Switzerland's largest trading partner, and Switzerland is the EU's fourth largest trading partner. Switzerland accounts for 5.2% of the EU's imports; mainly chemicals, medicinal products, machinery, instruments and time pieces. In terms of services, the EU's exports to Switzerland amounted to €67.0 billion in 2008 while imports from Switzerland stood at €47.2 billion.
Switzerland signed a free-trade agreement with the then European Economic Community in 1972, which entered into force in 1973.
Switzerland is a member of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), and took part in negotiating the European Economic Area (EEA) agreement with the European Union. It signed the agreement on 2 May 1992, and submitted an application for accession to the EU on 20 May 1992. However, after a Swiss referendum held on 6 December 1992 rejected EEA membership by 50.3% to 49.7%, the Swiss government decided to suspend negotiations for EU membership until further notice. However, its application was not formally withdrawn until 2016.
In 1994, Switzerland and the EU started negotiations about a special relationship outside the EEA. Switzerland wanted to safeguard the economic integration with the EU that the EEA treaty would have permitted, while purging the relationship of the points of contention that had led to the people rejecting the referendum. Swiss politicians stressed the bilateral nature of these negotiations, where negotiations were conducted between two equal partners and not between 16, 26, 28 or 29, as is the case for EU treaty negotiations.
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