EU Signals U.K. Trade Talks Are Still Months Away
April 29 2017 - 10:30AM
Dow Jones News
By Laurence Norman and Valentina Pop
BRUSSELS--The European Union adopted its core negotiating
positions for the coming Brexit negotiations Saturday, making it
clear to Britain that talks on a future trade agreement remain
months away.
EU leaders laid out their priorities for the talks, stressing
that while they want to secure a close future relationship with
Britain, their first objective was to carve out a clear
understanding on the divorce terms, including the future rights of
EU citizens in the U.K. and British acceptance that it must pay
tens of billions of euros worth of spending pledges to the
bloc.
EU officials have said that means discussions about a
post-Brexit trading agreement with the U.K. would likely begin only
toward the end of the year.
That would leave less than a year to discuss the future
relationship since the EU's chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, has
said he wants the talks wrapped up by October 2018 to leave time
for the ratification of a deal.
"Some are estimating, in a positive scenario, that [talks on a
trade agreement] could happen by the end of the year," Romanian
President Klaus Iohannis told reporters, stressing that complex
divorce issues must be resolved first.
Saturday's meeting was the first formal summit meeting of EU
leaders without U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May. It comes a month
after the U.K. government formally notified the bloc it was
leaving, the opening salvo of two years of negotiations before
Britain's planned March 2019 departure.
The first direct talks will take place after June 8, the date of
snap elections Mrs. May called earlier this month. Opinion polls
currently point to Mrs. May's Conservative party winning the vote
comfortably.
Mrs. May has called for Brexit negotiations to shift quickly to
focus on the future relationship, which she hopes will lock in
close security and economic ties and protect the U.K.'s powerful
financial-services industry.
However, the EU's negotiating partners have said those
discussions can only take place when sufficient progress is made on
the divorce terms. They have repeatedly said a future trade
agreement can only be finalized once Britain has left the bloc.
Some officials predict it will take years.
In a sign of the EU's unity up to this point, leaders agreed to
adopt their negotiating guidelines for the Brexit talks within a
minute of the meeting's start.
"Guidelines adopted unanimously. EU27 firm and fair political
mandate for the #Brexit talks is ready," European Council President
Donald Tusk said on Twitter.
Among the key points in the guidelines is that the U.K. cannot
gain sector-by-sector access to the single market, that any
post-Brexit transitional deal must be time-limited, and that EU
courts must continue to have a role in Britain after Britain's exit
from the bloc.
They emphasize the importance of ensuring no hard border is
re-established between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland
and even touch on issues like the future legal status of Gibraltar,
a small British territory subject to a centuries-old territorial
dispute with Spain.
The U.K.'s main business lobby group, Confederation of British
Industry, responded by urging that trade talks take place as soon
as possible.
"With well over EUR600 billion worth of trade every year between
the U.K. and EU, the economic case for making rapid progress on a
trade agreement is crystal clear," it said.
In recent days, some EU leaders have raised questions about the
British readiness to make the necessary compromises to ensure the
talks end in a deal. German Chancellor Angela Merkel told lawmakers
Thursday she is concerned that some in Britain still have
"illusions" that the U.K. can leave the bloc and still enjoy many
of the benefits of EU membership.
However, on Saturday, Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel
said he hoped Mrs. May would arrive at the negotiating table after
the British election with the flexibility to face down those in her
party unwilling to make any major concessions to Europe.
"I think it's an internal problem she wants to resolve in the
Conservative party to have not hard Brexit nor soft Brexit, but
Theresa's Brexit so she needs support from the population," Mr.
Bettel told reporters.
Still, there was recognition that whatever the election outcome,
the months ahead would involve some tense, difficult
discussions.
It is likely that the U.K. "will do everything to divide the 27
countries. That is a trap we should avoid falling into," said
Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel.
Write to Laurence Norman at laurence.norman@wsj.com and
Valentina Pop at valentina.pop@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 29, 2017 10:15 ET (14:15 GMT)
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