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INDUSTRY & TRADE

Germany slaps Bosch with huge fine over ‘dieselgate’ role

German prosecutors said Thursday they had fined car parts supplier Bosch €90 million over its role supplying components in the "dieselgate" emissions cheating scandal.

Germany slaps Bosch with huge fine over 'dieselgate' role
Photo: DPA

Stuttgart investigators “levied a fine against Robert Bosch GmbH for negligently infringing its quality control obligations,” they said in a statement, adding that the German company had agreed not to contest the fine.

The €90 million sum is made up of a penalty of two million, while the remaining 88 million covers the estimated economic benefit Bosch gained from the crimes.

SEE ALSO: How diesel bans have ignited a debate about dirty tricks and dodgy money

Beginning in 2008, Bosch “delivered around 17 million motor control and mixture control devices to various domestic and foreign manufacturers, some of whose software contained illegal strategies,” the prosecutors found.

“Cars fitted with the devices emitted more nitrogen oxides than allowed under regulations.”

Volkswagen admitted in 2015 to fitting 11 million cars worldwide with such technology, and the fallout has so far cost the German car behemoth more than 30 billion euros. Further legal proceedings are outstanding against both VW and former executives as individuals.

In its own statement, Bosch said it “will continue to expand its compliance organisation continuously in order to minimise the risk of violations of applicable law”.

The firm promises “product development that is focused on the protection of human health and the environment”.

It added that it had also retrained one-in-four of its workforce, or 100,000 workers, most of them in research and development, in a new code of conduct.

For Bosch, the fine closes legal proceedings against the company over dieselgate.

While prosecutors are still probing whether employees were involved in criminal actions, authorities believe “the initiative for the integration and form of the illegal strategies both came from employees at the car manufacturers” rather than suppliers like Bosch.

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FARMING

WTO rules US tariffs on Spanish olives breach rules

A US decision to slap steep import duties on Spanish olives over claims they benefited from subsidies constituted a violation of international trade rules, the World Trade Organisation ruled Friday.

WTO rules US tariffs on Spanish olives breach rules
Farmers had just begun harvesting olives in southern Spain when former US President Donald Trump soured the mood with the tariffs' announcement. Photo: Jorge Guerrero/AFP

Former US president Donald Trump’s administration slapped extra tariffs on Spain’s iconic agricultural export in 2018, considering their olives were subsidised and being dumped on the US market at prices below their real value.

The combined rates of the anti-subsidy and anti-dumping duties go as high as 44 percent.

The European Commission, which handles trade policy for the 27 EU states, said the move was unacceptable and turned to the WTO, where a panel of experts was appointed to examine the case.

In Friday’s ruling, the WTO panel agreed with the EU’s argument that the anti-subsidy duties were illegal.

But it did not support its stance that the US anti-dumping duties violated international trade rules.

The panel said it “recommended that the United States bring its measures into conformity with its obligations”.

EU trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis hailed the ruling, pointing out that the US duties “severely hit Spanish olive producers.”

Demonstrators take part in a 2019 protest in Madrid, called by the olive sector
Demonstrators take part in a 2019 protest in Madrid called by the olive sector to denounce low prices of olive oil and the 25 percent tariff that Spanish olives and olive oil faced in the United States. (Photo by PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU / AFP)
 

“We now expect the US to take the appropriate steps to implement the WTO ruling, so that exports of ripe olives from Spain to the US can resume under normal conditions,” he said.

The European Commission charges that Spain’s exports of ripe olives to the United States, which previously raked in €67 million ($75.6 million) annually, have shrunk by nearly 60 percent since the duties were imposed.

The office of the US Trade Representative in Washington did not immediately comment on the ruling.

According to WTO rules, the parties have 60 days to file for an appeal.

If the United States does file an appeal though, it would basically amount to a veto of the ruling.

That is because the WTO Appellate Body — also known as the supreme court of world trade — stopped functioning in late 2019 after Washington blocked the appointment of new judges.

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