Tag: Brussels summit

European Parliament Overwhelmingly Approves Brexit Deal

“We will always love you and you will never be far,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.


The first chapter of the Brexit saga was formally cleared for completion on Wednesday when the European Parliament endorsed the latest Brexit deal following an emotional debate.

“We will always love you and you will never be far,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said.

The head of the parliament’s Brexit steering group, Guy Verhofstadt, said that the vote was not “an adieu” but “only an au revoir.”

“If we could stop Brexit by voting ‘no’ today I would be the first to recommend it,” he said.

Members of the chamber even broke into a song, singing traditional Scottish farewell song Auld Lang Syne.

Also read: European Parliament Defers Vote on Anti-CAA Resolution, India Calls It ‘Diplomatic Victory’

Farage: ‘What’s not to like?’

While some UK lawmakers also expressed regret over the looming Brexit, representatives of the Brexit Party waved goodbye with the miniature Union Jack flags that adorn their desks in the chamber.

“No more financial contributions, no more European Court of Justice, no more common fisheries policy, no more being talked down to, no more being bullied, no more Guy Verhofstadt — what’s not to like?” Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage said.

EU lawmaker Martin Sonneborn, a representative of Germany’s satirical Die Partei, tweeted a video of Farage leaving the chamber with the caption: “Starting now, I’m the only political clown in here… Smiley!”

The vote saw 641 deputies support the deal with 49 voting against it and 13 abstaining. Passage of the motion had always been seen as a formality, but it was the last hurdle that could have prevented the UK from leaving the political institutions of the EU as of January 31.

Once again, from the top

The UK will enter a transition period which is set to end on December 31. The Brexit deal allows the country to keep its trade and travel connections with the bloc until this deadline expires, but the two sides still need to work out a long-term relationship to avoid a cliff-edge scenario.

Also read: Brexit Bill Clears Final UK Parliamentary Hurdle Ahead of January 31 Exit

No trade deal of a similar magnitude has ever been achieved in such a short time.

The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier met with envoys of the remaining 27 EU states on Wednesday. According to diplomatic sources quoted by the Reuters news agency, Barnier said that a loose association, similar to the agreement between the UK and Ukraine, should be used as a model for the future relationship with the UK.

“We will not give ground on issues that are important to us,” Barnier was quoted as saying.

EU flag to keep flying in Scotland

Also on Wednesday, the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh voted to keep the EU flag flying outside the parliament building after Brexit.

The assembly, dominated by proponents of secession from the UK, also voted to hold a new independence referendum. The impact of the vote would likely remain symbolic, as Scotland is not allowed to hold the vote without the approval from the government in London. Thus far, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has resisted calls for a referendum in Scotland.

The pro-independence side lost the 2014 plebiscite with just over 55% of the voters rejecting the idea of Scotland leaving the UK.

At the 2016 referendum, however, 62% of Scottish voters supported staying in the EU. The pro-independence parties now hope to see Scotland separate from the UK and then rejoin the EU as a sovereign nation.

The article was originally published on DW. You can read it here. 

British PM May Seeks More Time, Promises Brexit Deal Vote by March 12

As the Brexit crisis goes down to the wire, May said a so-called “meaningful vote” would not take place this week as expected.

Egypt: Prime Minister Theresa May put off a vote in parliament on her Brexit deal until as late as March 12 – just 17 days before Britain is due to leave the EU – setting up a showdown this week with lawmakers who accuse her of running out the clock.

As the Brexit crisis goes down to the wire, May said a so-called “meaningful vote” would not take place this week as expected. Parliament will still hold a series of Brexit votes on Wednesday, but May’s deal itself will not be on the table.

On her way to an EU-Middle East summit, May said she is close to bringing home changes to her agreement that would satisfy objections to it, but needed time for meetings with European leaders which meant it would not be ready this week.

“We won’t bring a meaningful vote to parliament this week but we will ensure that that happens by the 12th of March,” May told reporters on board her plane. “It is still within our grasp to leave the European Union with a deal on the 29th of March and that is what we are working to do.”

Opponents accuse her of deliberately running out the clock, so as to force parliament to choose between a deal it has already rejected or leaving the EU with no deal at all, which businesses say would destroy their supply chains.

Both May’s Conservatives and the main opposition Labour Party are formally committed to exiting the EU in line with a 2016 referendum vote, but both parties are internally divided over how or even whether to do so.

Cabinet split

Before May set off for Egypt, three members of her cabinet publicly split with government policy and said they would side with rebels and opposition parties to stop a no-deal Brexit.

Yvette Cooper, an opposition Labour lawmaker who has proposed a bill that would block a no-deal Brexit, said May’s “last minute announcement that she won’t put a deal to parliament this week, and is leaving it until just two weeks before Brexit day, is utterly shambolic and irresponsible.”

“She cannot just keep drifting and dithering like this or there is a real risk our whole country tumbles off a cliff edge into a chaotic no deal that no one is ready for and that would hit food prices, medicine supplies, manufacturing and security.”

Some lawmakers will seek to grab control of Brexit in Wednesday’s series of votes, though such attempts have previously been defeated as May sought more time to get a deal.

Senior Labour figures said that the main opposition party was moving closer to supporting another Brexit referendum and could do so as soon as early as this week.

9 Labour lawmakers and three Conservatives quit their parties last week in the biggest shakeup of its kind in British politics for decades, raising the prospect of further defections from both parties.

The British parliament voted 432-202 against May’s deal in January, a defeat by the biggest margin in modern British history. May says she can still win support for it if EU leaders ease rules intended to ensure no hard land border ever appears between British-ruled Northern Ireland and the rest of Ireland.

European Council President Donald Tusk told May that the EU needs clarity that whatever the bloc might offer would command a majority in the British parliament, before a summit of EU leaders scheduled for March 21-22, an EU official said.

EU officials have considered many theoretical scenarios, including an extension of Brexit for up to two years, though it is unclear if such a delay would resolve the current impasse.

The EU has ruled out reopening the withdrawal agreement. Both sides are looking at a possible legal addendum to reassure lawmakers who worry that the Irish border plans could keep Britain trapped in the EU’s orbit for years to come.

But Europeans sound increasingly frustrated at Britain’s political chaos: “You need two to dance tango, and I know how to dance,” European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said when asked if he was running out of things to give on Brexit. “I have a certain Brexit fatigue.”

EU Leaders to Unite on Brexit Demands at Brussels Summit

European Union leaders in an unprecedented show of unity will meet at a summit in Brussels where they will adopt tough guidelines for two years of Brexit talks.

FILE PHOTO: EU and Union flags fly above Parliament Square in London, Britain March 25, 2017. REUTERS/Peter Nicholls/File Photo

EU and Union flags fly above Parliament Square in London, Britain, March 25, 2017. Credit: Reuters/Peter Nicholls/File Photo

Brussels: European Union leaders will endorse a stiff set of divorce terms for Britain at a summit on Saturday, rejoicing in a rare show of unity in adversity, but well aware that may start to fray once negotiations begin.

Meeting for the first time since British Prime Minister Theresa May formally triggered a two-year countdown to Brexit in late March, the 27 other EU leaders will lose little time over a lunch in Brussels in approving an eight page set of negotiating guidelines hammered out by their diplomats over the past month.

Those will bind Michel Barnier, their chief negotiator, to seek a deal that secures the rights of three million EU expats living in Britain, ensure London pays tens of billions of euros Brussels thinks it will be owed and avoids destabilising peace by creating a hard EU-UK border across the island of Ireland.

They also rule out discussing the free trade deal May wants until they see progress on agreeing to those key withdrawal terms.

In a mark of how last year’s Brexit vote has called into question the unity of the United Kingdom itself, leaders will also offer Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny a pledge that if Northern Ireland, which voted against Brexit, ever unites with his country, it will automatically be in the EU.

The leaders may spend more time in discussions, including with Barnier, on what criteria they may use to judge, come the autumn, whether he has made sufficient progress to warrant a start on trade talks. They may also talk about how to manage a transition, after Britain leaves in 2019, to a new relationship likely to take many more years to finalise.

That decision on what is “sufficient” is the kind of debate that can poison relations as the 27 seek to protect national interests. Also contentious will be which countries scoop the prizes of hosting two EU agencies set to be moved from London.

With most of the 27 offering to house the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and several wanting the European Banking Authority (EBA), summit chair Donald Tusk and EU chief executive Jean-Claude Juncker will propose they agree in June on criteria for making the choices to avoid a repeat of previous bunfights.

“We are remarkably united,” one national leader who will be at the table told Reuters this week. “But then it’s always easy to be united on what you want before you start negotiating.”

Differences

Among possible differences, the priorities of poor, eastern states are to secure residency rights for their many workers in Britain and British money for the EU budget; Germany and others set store by a smooth transition to a new free trade agreement.

Unwonted unity has been forged by the shock of Brexit; it breaks a taboo and raises fears of further break-up at the hands of nationalists like French far-right leader Marine Le Pen. She will contest her country’s presidential election run-off on May 7, though few expect her to beat centrist Emmanuel Macron.

The EU sees it as vital that Britain not be seen to profit from Brexit to avoid encouraging other states to follow suit.

However, some officials are also voicing concern that the process of weaving maximalist demands into the negotiating text could risk souring the atmosphere with May, who expects to start talks shortly after the UK election she has called for June 8.

Senior officials in Brussels believe the risk of a breakdown in talks that could see Britain simply walking out into chaotic legal limbo in March 2019 has diminished since May wrote to Tusk on March 29 in terms recognising she would have to compromise.

But German Chancellor Angela Merkel, facing her own election in September, warned Britain this week against lingering “illusions” of how much access it would retain to EU markets.

And some diplomats fear the tone of EU negotiating demands could sound too aggressive and create a popular backlash in Britain that might then make it hard for May to agree to a deal.

“These are legally solid arguments,” one said, noting, for example, a demand Britain not only lose the EMA and EBA but also pay the moving costs. “But we don’t want to sound too punitive.”

(Reuters)