The European Commission has confirmed plans to submit a proposal to the European Council in June for signing the 28-nation bloc’s trade deal with Canada, amid continued questions over the pact’s potential fate in the ratification stages. The news came as part of a meeting of trade ministers from the EU’s 28 member states. The Brussels gathering also saw ministers – meeting under the European Council – discuss next steps for the bloc’s trade deals with the US, including a new sustainability impact assessment. Canada “mixed deal”? The EU and Canada completed negotiations for a bilateral trade deal – known as the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, or CETA – in 2014, following six years of talks. While the negotiations themselves were already difficult to complete, getting the deal to the signature and ratification stages has also proven challenging, with public debate in both the EU and Canada focused heavily on topics such as the potential investor protection and dispute settlement provisions of the pact. Earlier this year, a legal scrub of the agreement saw the two sides change the deal in order to incorporate an investment court system which the EU has said should become the norm for all...