The president Ignazio Cassis says Swiss relations with the EU need to improve and is calling for a calm and creative approach to settle many outstanding issues.
Ties between the EU and Switzerland are strained following the Swiss decision to end talks to bring the current collection of agreements with the bloc into one all-encompassing framework agreement.
In an interview with the SonntagsZeitung, Cassis says this country needs to move away from purely technical issues and focus in the needs of society.
He says there needs to be more cooperation with health, research and culture programmes with the EU.
The main stumbling blocks are the setting up of a dispute settlement agreement and this country’s reluctance to agree to the EU’s budgetary demands and the level of harmonisation with single market rules.
Switzerland is the EU’s fourth largest trading partner.
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