Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/870 of 24 June 2020 imposing a definitive countervailing duty and definitively collecting the provisional countervailing duty imposed on imports of continuous filament glass fibre products originating in Egypt, and levying the definitive countervailing duty on the registered imports of continuous filament glass fibre products originating in Egypt

Article 3

The amounts secured by way of the provisional countervailing duty under Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/379 shall be definitively collected.

Article 4

This Regulation shall enter into force on the day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

Done at Brussels, 24 June 2020.

For the Commission The President Ursula VON DER LEYEN

(1) OJ L 176, 30.6.2016, p. 55.

(2) OJ C 192, 7.6.2019, p. 30.

(3) OJ C 48, 12.2.2020, p. 18.

(4) Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/379 of 5 March 2020 imposing a provisional countervailing duty on imports of continuous filament glass fibre products originating in Egypt (OJ L 69, 6.3.2020, p. 14).

(5) See Note to the file on the consequences of the coronavirus outbreak on anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations, reference t20.001226 and the Commission Notice on the consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak on anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations (OJ C 86, 16.3.2020, p. 6).

(6) Memorandum of Understanding Between the Arab Republic of Egypt and the People’s Republic of China, April 18th, 1997.

(7) Report of the State Council Development and Research Center, ‘The sustainable development experience in the China-Egypt Suez Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone’, 6 August 2019 (‘State Council Report’).

(8) Presidential Decree No. (35) of the Arab Republic of Egypt, dated 15/2/2003.

(9) TEDA 10 Years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 4.

(10) Report of the State Council Development and Research Center, ‘The sustainable development experience in the China-Egypt Suez Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone’, 6 August 2019 (‘State Council Report’.

(11) TEDA 10 Years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 11.

(12) State Council Report.

(13) TEDA 10 years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 53.

(14) State Council Report.

(15) Decree of the President of the Arab Republic of Egypt No 330 of the year 2015 On the establishment of the Suez Canal Economic Zone, August 19th, 2015.

(16) Report of the State Council Development and Research Center, ‘The sustainable development experience in the China-Egypt Suez Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone’, 6 August 2019.

(17) By the National Development and Reform Commission (‘NDRC’) and by the Ministry of Commerce (‘MOFCOM’).

(18) TEDA 10 Years Summary Report, p. 41.

(19) Comments of President Morsi during his visit to China from August 2012, TEDA 10 Years Summary Report, p. 47 & 53; Comments of President Sisi during his visit to China in December 2016, TEDA 10 Years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 94.

(20) TEDA 10 Years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 59.

(21) The three regions referred to in the text are the EU, India and Turkey.

(22) Council Implementing Regulation (EU) No 248/2011 of 9 March 2011 imposing a definitive anti-dumping duty and collecting definitively the provisional duty imposed on imports of certain continuous filament glass fibre products originating in the People’s Republic of China (OJ L 67, 15.3.2011, p. 1).

(23) Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 1379/2014 of 16 December 2014 imposing a definitive countervailing duty on imports of certain filament glass fibre products originating in the People’s Republic of China and amending Council Implementing Regulation (EU) No 248/2011 imposing a definitive anti-dumping duty on imports of certain continuous filament glass fibre products originating in the People’s Republic of China (OJ L 367, 23.12.2014, p. 22).

(24) Annual Report on Development in Africa, No 19 (2016-2017, Yellow Books of Africa, p. 13).

(25) D. Brautigam & Xiaoyang Tang; Going Global in Groups: Structural transformation and China’s Special Economic Zones overseas, World Development Vol. 63, 2014, pp. 78-91.

(26) WT/DS2/AB/R – US – Reformulated Gasoline, Appellate Body Report adopted on 20 May 1996, p. 17.

(27) See in detail J. Pauwelyn, The Role of Public International Law in the WTO – How far can we go?, American Journal of International Law (2001), pp. 535 and following; Graham Cook, Digest of WTO Jurisprudence on Public International Law Concepts and Principles (CUP 2015).

(28) WT/DS379 – United States – Definitive Anti-Dumping and Countervailing Duties on Certain Products from China, Appellate Body Report adopted on 11 March 2011, §§308; M.E. Villiger, ‘Commentary on the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties’ (Martinus Nijhoff, 2009), p. 433.

(29) International Law Commission, Draft Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts, November 2001, Supplement No 10 (A/56/10), chp.IV.E.1.

(30) WT/DS379/AB/R, paras. 304 – 322.

(31) International Law Commission, Draft Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts, with commentaries, November 2001, Supplement No 10 (A/56/10), p. 52, recital 3 to Article 11.

(32) TEDA 10 Years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 94.

(33) Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1690 of 9 November 2018 imposing definitive countervailing duties on imports of certain pneumatic tyres, new or retreaded, of rubber, of a kind used for buses or lorries and with a load index exceeding 121 originating in the People's Republic of China and amending Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1579 imposing a definitive anti-dumping duty and collecting definitively the provisional duty imposed on imports of certain pneumatic tyres, new or retreaded, of rubber, of a kind used for buses or lorries, with a load index exceeding 121 originating in the People's Republic of China and repealing Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/163 (OJ L 283, 12.11.2018, p. 1), recitals 409 to 412.

(34) Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1690, recital 377.

(35) See Article 3(1)(a)(iv) of the basic Regulation and Article 1.1(a)(1)(iv) of the SCM Agreement.

(36) Appellate Body Report, US – DRAMs, (WT/DS296/AB/R), para. 112.

(37) Incidentally, the facts at issue may also be considered from the angle of Article 16 of the ILC Articles. The close cooperation between the GOE and the GOC not only resulted in acknowledgment and adoption of Chinese acts by the GOE, but also served to potentially circumvent actual and potential duties imposed by the EU on Chinese exports of the product concerned made from Egypt.

(38) ‘Definitive disclosure’ is the same as ‘final disclosure’ referred to in Section 1.4 above.

(39) Case T-300/16 Judgment of the General Court (First Chamber, Extended Composition) of 10 April 2019, Jindal Saw Ltd and Jindal Saw Italia SpA v European Commission ECLI:EU:T:2019:235, para 101; also T 67/14 Viraj Profiles v Council, judgment of 11 July 2017, not published, EU:T:2017:481, para 88.

(40) WT/DS379/AB/R, Appellate Body Report, US – AD and CVD (China), para 309.

(41) Mondev International Ltd. v. United States of America (ICSID Additional Facility Case No. ARB(AF)/99/2), Award of 11 October 2002, para. 115 and note 47.

(42) ICJ, Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Serbia and Montenegro, judgment of 27 February 2007, para. 414. In that case, the International Court of Justice started from the premise that it was legally possible for the Federal State of Serbia and Montenegro to acknowledge and adopt acts of genocide committed by the organized military forces of the ‘Republik Srpska’, the de facto Serbian State on the territory of Bosnia Herzegovina during the civil war in that country from 1991 to 1995. It found, though, that such acknowledgment and adoption had not occurred in practice.

(43) WT/DS379/AB/R (US – Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties on Certain Products from China), Appellate Body Report of 11 March 2011, DS 379, paragraph 318. See also WT/DS436/AB/R (US – Carbon Steel (India)), Appellate Body Report of 8 December 2014, paragraphs 4.9 – 4.10, 4.17 – 4.20 and WT/DS437/AB/R (United States – Countervailing Duty Measures on Certain Products from China) Appellate Body Report of 18 December 2014, paragraph 4.92.

(44) See recitals 183 to 185 of Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/ 72 of 17 January 2019 imposing a definitive countervailing duty on imports of electric bicycles originating in the People's Republic of China (OJ L 16, 18.1.2019, p. 5) (‘Ebikes from China’), recital 91 of Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2017/969 of 8 June 2017 imposing definitive countervailing duties on imports of certain hot-rolled flat products of iron, non-alloy or other alloy steel originating in the People's Republic of China and amending Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2017/649 imposing a definitive anti-dumping duty on imports of certain hot-rolled flat products of iron, non-alloy or other alloy steel originating in the People's Republic of China (OJ L 146, 9.6.2017, p. 17) (‘HRF from China’) and recitals 175 to 177 of Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1690 (‘Tyres from China’).

(45) http://english.eximbank.gov.cn/Profile/AboutTB/Introduction/ accessed on 14 April 2020.

(46) See (HRF from China, recital 132, Tyres from China, recital 210.

(47) See Ebikes from China, recitals 195 to 202, HRF from China, recitals 100-101, Tyres from China, recitals 188 to 192.

(48) Catalogue for Guiding Industry Restructuring (2011 Version) (2013 Amendment) (Issued by Order No 9 of the National Development and Reform Commission on March 27, 2011, and amended in accordance with the Decision of the National Development and Reform Commission on Amending the Relevant Clauses of the Catalogue for Guiding Industry Restructuring (2011 Version) issued by Order No 21 of the National Development and Reform Commission on February 16, 2013).

(49) According to the Implementing Measures of the CBIRC for Administrative Licensing Matters for Chinese-funded Commercial Banks (Order of the CBIRC [2017] No 1), the Implementing Measures of the CBIRC for Administrative Licensing Matters relating to Foreign-funded Banks (Order of the CBIRC [2015] No 4) and the Administrative Measures for the Qualifications of Directors and Senior Officers of Financial Institutions in the Banking Sector (CBIRC [2013] No 3).

(50) See HRF and Tyres cases, recital 132 and recital 211 respectively.

(51) See HRF and Tyres cases.

(52) WT/DS/296 (DS296 United States – Countervailing duty investigation on Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAMS) from Korea), Appellate Body Report of 21 February 2005, para.116.

(53) Appellate Body Report, DS 296, para. 116.

(54) Appellate Body Report, DS 296, para. 115.

(55) Appellate Body Report, DS 296, para. 114 agreeing with the Panel Report, DS 194, para. 8.31. on that account.

(56) Appellate Body Report, DS 296, para. 115.

(57) Ebikes case, recitals 238 to 244, Tyres case, recitals 237 to 242.

(58) IMF Working Paper ‘Resolving China’s Corporate Debt Problem’, by Wojciech Maliszewski, Serkan Arslanalp, John Caparusso, José Garrido, Si Guo, Joong Shik Kang, W. Raphael Lam, T. Daniel Law, Wei Liao, Nadia Rendak, Philippe Wingender, Jiangyan, October 2016, WP/16/203.

(59) Livingston, M. Poon, W.P.H. and Zhou, L. (2017). Are Chinese Credit Ratings Relevant? A Study of the Chinese Bond Market and Credit Rating Industry, in Journal of Banking & Finance, p. 24.

(60) Price, A.H., Brightbill T.C., DeFrancesco R.E., Claeys, S.J., Teslik, A. and Neelakantan, U. (2017). China’s broken promises: why it is not a market-economy, Wiley Rein LLP, p. 68.

(61) For an example, see Reuters. (2016). Fitch Rates Shougang’s USD Senior Notes Final ‘A-’ https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSFit982112, (accessed on 21 October 2017).

(62) Lin, L.W. and Milhaupt, C.J. (2016). Bonded to the State: A Network Perspective on China’s Corporate Debt Market. Columbia Law and Economics Working Paper No 543, p. 20; Livingstone, M. Poon, W.P.H. and Zhou, L. (2017). Are Chinese Credit Ratings Relevant? A Study of the Chinese Bond Market and Credit Rating Industry, in Journal of Banking & Finance. p. 9.

(63) Ebikes case, recital 241, Tyres case, recital 240.

(64) See Tentative Measures for the Administration of the Credit Rating Business Regarding the Securities Market Promulgated by Chinese Securities Regulatory Commission, Order of the China Securities Regulatory Commission [2007] No 50, 24 August 2007; Notice of the People’s Bank of China on Qualifications of China Cheng Xin Securities Rating Co., Ltd. and other Institutions Engaged in Corporate Bond Credit Rating Business, Yinfa [1997] No 547, 16 December 1997, and Announcement No 14 [2018] of the People’s Bank of China and the China Securities Regulatory Commission on Issues Concerning the Provision of Bond Rating Services by Credit Rating Agencies on the Interbank Bond Market and the Stock Exchange Bond Market.

(65) See ‘Announcement of PBOC on Issues concerning the Credit Rating Business Carried out by Credit Rating Agencies on the Interbank Bond Market’, effective on July 1, 2017.

(66) PBOC Working Paper No 2017/5, May 25, 2017, p. 28.

(67) Statistics of the Central Bank of Egypt: Average interest rates on EGP Loans for the investigation period, based on the weighted average interest rates for a sample of banks whose deposits represent around 80 % of total deposits of the banking system and calculated on a monthly basis, see https://www.cbe.org.eg/en/EconomicResearch/Statistics/Pages/MonthlyInterestRatesHistorical.aspx

(68) For further details see Arrangement on Officially Supported Export Credits, January 2019, TAD/PG(2019)1 and Country Risk Classifications of the Participants to the Arrangement on Officially Supported Export Credits.

(69) Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1690, Section 3.7.

(70) http://cnbm.wsfg.hk/index.php?SectionID=FinancialReports&PageID=2019&Language=eng (last viewed on 20 November 2019).

(71) http://www.cnbm.com.cn/EN/0000001600070008002/, accessed on 24 April 2020.

(72) Annual Report 2019, CNBM.

(73) Information panel at the entrance of the Jushi Egypt plant.

(74) China Jushi Online News Center, as well as article ‘Jushi plans to establish a factory in India’, JEC Composites News, 4 Aug 2016, http://www.jeccomposites.com/knowledge/international-composites-news/jushi-plans-establish-factory-india (last accessed on 3 February 2020).

(75) http://www.gov.cn/zhengce/content/2015-05/19/content_9784.htm

(76) See US-China Economic and Security Review Commission: The 13th Five-Year Plan, page 12.

(77) https://www.cae.cn/cae/html/files/2015-10/29/20151029105822561730637.pdf

(78) See Made in China 2025 Roadmap. p. 142, 152.

(79) See Made in China 2025, Chapter 4: Strategic Support and Supply.

(80) ‘Xiao Yaqing: to build a “going out” national new business card after the reorganization of the enterprise’, Source: Sina Finance Author: Sina Finance Published: 2016-08-29.

(81) http://cnbm.wsfg.hk/index.php?SectionID=FinancialReports&PageID=2019&Language=eng (last viewed on 20 November 2019).

(82) See among others the Commission Staff Working Document on significant distortions in the economy of the People’s Republic of China for the purposes of trade defence investigation, SWD(2017) 483 final/2 of 20.12.2017, available at:https://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2017/december/tradoc_156474.pdf

(83) The evidence substantiating the conclusion on the public body nature of SASAC can be found, inter alia, in Section 5 of the Commission Staff Working Document SWD (2017) 483, see previous footnote.

(84) The evidence substantiating the conclusion on the public body nature of the SRF can be found, inter alia, in the Tyres case, Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1690, in particular Section 3.7 recitals 341 through 360 of that Regulation.

(85) See also recital 358 of the tyres Regulation.

(86) See Implementing Regulation (EU) 2018/1690.

(87) See Tyres case, recital 418.

(88) Commission implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/776 of 12 June 2020 imposing definitive countervailing duties on imports of certain woven and/or stitched glass fibre fabrics originating in the People’s Republic of China and Egypt and amending Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/492 imposing definitive anti-dumping duties on imports of certain woven and/or stitched glass fibre fabrics originating in the People’s Republic of China and Egypt (OJ L 189, 15.6.2020, p. 1).

(89) Report of the State Council Development and Research Center, ‘The sustainable development experience in the China-Egypt Suez Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone’, 6 August 2019 (‘State Council Report’).

(90) Article 38(bis A) of the Law 83/2002, as amended in 2015; Article 20(bis) and Article 28 of Law 8/1997.

(91) TEDA 10 Years Summary Report (2008-2018), p. 4.

(92) http://www.wadidegla.com/Wadi-Degla-Holding/en/spage/page/223 (last accessed 15/05/2020).

(93) Public Go-Global Service of the Department of Commerce of Guangdong Province, http://go.gdcom.gov.cn/article.php?typeid=31&contentId=13961 (last accessed on 2 January 2020), as well as ‘China-Egypt TEDA Suez Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone’, Presentation on http://www.bern-cci.ch/export/fr1/marche.html (last accessed on 2 January 2020).

(94) World Bank Report of Doing Business 2020, Egypt, Arab Rep.

(95) Case T-301/16, Jindal Saw and Jindal Saw Italia v. Commission, ECLI:EU:T:2019:234, para. 187.

(96) The comparison between the Union industry’s prices and the exporting producer’s selling prices, both direct and via their related entities, to independent customers in the Union shows that these latter prices are significantly below the Union industry’s prices (14,89 %). Therefore, no matter how the price comparison would be made, the subsidised imports prices remain significantly below the Union industry’s prices, showing that the argument made by this party does also not have any practical impact in this case in addition to bearing no legal relevance.

(97) Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/199 of 13 February 2020 making imports of continuous filament glass fibre products originating in Egypt subject to registration (OJ L 42, 14.2.2020, p. 10).

(98) Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/1693 of 9 October 2019 imposing a provisional anti-dumping duty on imports of steel road wheels originating in the People’s Republic of China (OJ L 259, 10.10.2019, p. 15), recital 4.

(99) Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/1688 of 8 October 2019 imposing a definitive anti-dumping duty and definitively collecting the provisional duty imposed on imports of mixtures of urea and ammonium nitrate originating in Russia, Trinidad and Tobago and the United States of America (OJ L 258, 9.10.2019, p. 21), recitals 285 to 288.

(100) Regulation (EU) 2018/825 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 amending Regulation (EU) 2016/1036 on protection against dumped imports from countries not members of the European Union and Regulation (EU) 2016/1037 on protection against subsidised imports from countries not members of the European Union (OJ L 143, 7.6.2018, p. 1).

(101) Regulation (EU) 2018/825, recital 4.

(102) Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2018/1046 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 July 2018 on the financial rules applicable to the general budget of the Union, amending Regulations (EU) No 1296/2013, (EU) No 1301/2013, (EU) No 1303/2013, (EU) No 1304/2013, (EU) No 1309/2013, (EU) No 1316/2013, (EU) No 223/2014, (EU) No 283/2014, and Decision No 541/2014/EU and repealing Regulation (EU, Euratom) No 966/2012 (OJ L 193, 30.7.2018, p. 1).

(103) Regulation (EU) 2016/1036 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2016 on protection against dumped imports from countries not members of the European Union (OJ L 176, 30.6.2016, p. 21).