MUNICH, Feb 18 — British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said on Saturday a deal with the European Union to resolve problems around the Northern Ireland protocol was “by no means done”, but that the two sides now have an understanding of how it could be resolved.

“There are still challenges to work through ... there isn’t a deal that has been done. There is an understanding of what needs to be done,” Sunak said at the annual Munich Security Conference, where he is due to meet European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

“We’re working through them (the issues) hard and we will work through them intensely with the EU, but we are by no means done,” he said, following weeks of media speculation that a deal was close.

Sunak held a round of meetings with Northern Ireland’s main political parties in Belfast on Friday, telling them that progress had been made on a new deal to ease post-Brexit trade and customs rules.

Advertisement

But Jeffrey Donaldson, leader of Northern Ireland’s largest pro-British party, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), said there were some outstanding issues that needed to be addressed.

The DUP’s support is particularly crucial to any deal due to its year-long boycott of the region’s devolved power-sharing parliament in protest at the protocol.

Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar’s office said earlier in the day he had been briefed by von der Leyen on the state of the negotiations before her meeting with Sunak.

Advertisement

“The Taoiseach (Varadkar) expressed his strong wish to see a positive outcome that provides a new foundation for relations between the EU and the UK,” his office said. “Most importantly, he hoped for an agreement that can pave the way for restoration of the institutions under the Good Friday Agreement.”

At the conference Sunak also said Britain wanted to have a positive relationship with the bloc, which it exited in 2020, saying: “the UK may have left the European Union. It didn’t leave Europe. We are a European nation.” — Reuters