Umpteenth – and last? – rebound in the Brexit file. But this time, good news awaits millions of Britons and Europeans. After long months of negotiations and blocking, the European Union and the United Kingdom finally announced, Thursday, December 24, that an agreement had been reached on the trade relations that the two blocks will maintain after December 31. This agreement was essential for the effective exit of the United Kingdom from the European Union, in seven days. And the threat of a “no deal” had been hovering for many weeks now, because of the sticking points on which neither London nor Brussels seemed to want to move. The most recent, fishing, has long failed to derail the whole negotiation.
This trade agreement should govern the future relations between the two entities, while officially Brexit took place on January 31. Negotiations have been particularly tense lately, and the deadline for reaching this agreement is fast approaching. According to the statements of Nathalie Loiseau, MEP in charge of following the negotiations in the European Parliament, on Europe 1, on the morning of December 24, Boris Johnson and Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European executive, negotiated step by step, until last hours this December 24 in the morning.
Concessions on the British side?
France is closely following the progress of the negotiations. On Wednesday 23 December, Clément Beaune, Secretary of State in charge of European Affairs, said for his part that the final discussions on a post-Brexit agreement would be closed before December 31, the final deadline set by London and Brussels to find a agreement.
According to information which filtered Wednesday evening on the European side, the British have agreed to “huge concessions” over the past 48 hours, especially on the fishing issue. At the beginning of December, Michel Barnier, the European negotiator, and his British counterpart seemed to have somewhat lost hope of reaching an agreement, because of differences too great to reach an agreement. On the British side, the tabloid press rather welcomes the victory of Boris Johnson who would have made the EU bend, and especially Emmanuel Macron.
About ten days ago, Boris Johnson argued for his part that the possibility of a “no deal” was indeed real. Discussions around the issue of fishing, quotas allocated to fishermen and access to British waters separating the United Kingdom from the rest of the European Union have dragged on for months. And on this point, London has, for a very long time, seemed never to want to budge. Faced with London’s intransigence, the European Commission even decided to prepare the ground and take measures to avoid any blockage on 1is next January, the day after the UK’s final exit from the community bloc.
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