BRUSSELS, Oct 15 — Britain’s Brexit minister David Frost today said the UK was “encouraged” by EU proposals to fix problems in the trading arrangements in Northern Island, but warned that big divergences remained.
Frost made his comments in Brussels as he arrived for a working lunch with his EU counterpart Maros Sefcovic just days after the Europeans put forward a raft of proposals to solve problems caused by the Brexit deal in the British province.
The differences over Northern Ireland have embittered relations between EU and UK and threaten to cause a trade war that could bring bilateral trade to a standstill.
In its proposals, Brussels offered to significantly ease customs checks on British goods intended for Northern Ireland, a burning issue in post-Brexit relations.
“I think the EU has definitely made an effort in pushing beyond where they typically go in these areas and we’re quite encouraged by that,” Frost told reporters.
“But obviously, there is quite a big gap. And that’s what we’re talking about today,” he said.
The EU proposals are part of an effort to fix the Northern Ireland Protocol, the special post-Brexit arrangement that keeps the British province subject to EU rules on trade.
It was drawn up, and only reluctantly accepted by the UK, in an effort to avoid a hard border across the island of Ireland that would jeopardise the stability achieved since the Good Friday peace agreement in 1998.
Sources in Brussels said EU commission vice president Sefcovic briefed diplomats that the deal on the table was as far as the Europeans could go and that member states must prepare for the eventuality that the offer would be turned down.
The latest spate of talks are expected to last weeks and perhaps into the new year and Frost indicated that Britain would stick by its red line on the role of the EU’s European Court of Justice (ECJ) as arbiter in disputes involving the province.
“We need to take the court out of the system as it is now and we need to find a better way forward,” Frost said.
Looming over the talks is Article 16 of the protocol — which gives either side the right to suspend parts of the trading arrangement in exceptional circumstances.
Britain has threatened to use that provision by early November if the EU does not redraw the protocol. Europe could retaliate a month later once it has done so. — AFP
