LONDON, June 28 — A deal is likely in the coming days to resolve the post-Brexit “sausage war” between the UK and EU, European Commission vice president Maros Sefcovic said today.
London has angered Brussels by threatening to extend a grace period for conducting checks on chilled meat products to Northern Ireland, sparking threats of reprisals.
But temperatures have cooled in recent days, with indications of a compromise, after the UK government submitted a formal request for an extension.
Last week, EU member Ireland said it had stepped in to try to resolve the row amicably — and Sefcovic indicated to Northern Irish lawmakers that progress had been made.
“While I cannot today announce the EU’s formal agreement to the UK government’s request... I remain confident that we can find a solution within the next 48 hours that will address both sides’ needs and concerns,” he added.
“I hope that jointly we can solve the issue of chilled meat within 48 hours,” he told the Northern Ireland Executive Office committee.
“We will have three months to have another attempt to solve this issue.”
Sefcovic argues that “80 per cent” of the hold-ups caused by checks could be resolved if the UK signed up to a “Swiss-style” form of controls on animals and plants.
The UK formally left the European single market and customs union on January 1, nearly four years after the public voted to leave the bloc in a landmark referendum.
A last-gasp trade deal was signed on December 24, with a separate “protocol” governing trade from Great Britain — England, Scotland and Wales — to Northern Ireland.
The move, imposing customs controls on certain goods crossing the Irish Sea, was designed to prevent unchecked products entering the bloc by the back door via Ireland.
But pro-UK unionist communities in Northern Ireland have objected strongly, arguing it puts the province’s place in the wider UK under threat, and has triggered unrest.
Potential EU reprisals on the transport of chilled meats to Northern Ireland blew up into a row at the recent G7 summit, where European leaders vowed no compromise and urged Boris Johnson to implement what he signed.
But the UK prime minister in turn called for Brussels to respect the country’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, and not threaten Northern Ireland’s fragile peace.
The protocol was designed as a compromise to uphold the terms of the 1998 peace deal that ended three decades of violence over British rule, and to keep the former flashpoint border with Ireland open. — AFP
