Italy on Tuesday will present an appeal against the decision to assign the European Medicines Agency (EMA) to Amsterdam, rather than Milan, Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala said Premier Paolo Gentiloni has told him. The appeal comes after EMA chief Giudo Rasi said Monday that a stopgap solution for the agency, which is leaving London because of Brexit, proposed by the Dutch city is not "optimal". Amsterdam won the right to host the agency by the luck of the draw after a vote of EU member States ended in a tie. "I called Gentiloni and I told him that it's time to be aggressive, let's have a go, let's try all the way and that's how it'll be," Sala told RTL 102.5 radio. "The appeal will be sent today".
Dutch officials said earlier the EMA would be housed in temporary accommodation in Amsterdam before a new headquarters is completed for the agency's relocation from London. Rasi, for his part, said the Amsterdam building destined for EMA was not yet ready and the stopgap solution proposed by the Dutch "is not optimal" because it "halves" the space of the London office. This would add "layers of complexity", he said, to the agency's move and would lengthen the time needed to begin functioning fully again.
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