Amid Brexit Impasse, Theresa May Says Deal Is ‘Achievable’

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/world/europe/brexit-theresa-may.html

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LONDON — After a significant setback in talks over Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union, Prime Minister Theresa May on Monday insisted that an agreement was still “achievable” as she tried to prevent a crucial meeting with her European counterparts this week from turning a diplomatic deadlock into a crisis.

Mrs. May is scheduled to meet the other leaders in Brussels on Wednesday, but a summit once seen as an opportunity to agree on most of the outlines of a withdrawal deal is fast becoming a political salvage operation.

Beset by political difficulties at home — where hard-line Brexit supporters in her cabinet are said to be contemplating resignation — Mrs. May acknowledged that there were a few “critical issues” that still needed to be agreed on with the European Union. Pre-summit talks took a bad turn in Brussels on Sunday.

“I do not believe the U.K. and the E.U. are far apart,” Mrs. May told lawmakers on Monday. The two sides, she said, “cannot let this disagreement derail the prospects of a good deal and leave us with the no deal outcome that no one wants.”

Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, underscored his concerns in a formal invitation letter to the summit meeting that said leaders should “remain hopeful and determined” but “must prepare the E.U. for a no-deal scenario, which is more likely than ever before.”

The impasse was made manifest on Sunday when Britain’s Brexit secretary, Dominic Raab, came to Brussels and rejected proposals drafted by European Union and British officials, puncturing hopes of significant progress at this week’s Brussels meeting.

The main outstanding issue is a “backstop” plan to ensure that, whatever happens in talks on future trade, there would be no need to impose checks at the physical border between Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, and Ireland, which will remain in the European Union.

The summit meeting had been expected to at least make definitive progress toward a withdrawal agreement — often likened to a divorce settlement — and give guidelines for Britain’s future relationship with the bloc.

With Britain scheduled to quit the bloc at the end of March, and any withdrawal agreement needing ratification by the British and European Parliaments, there is anxiety about timing and increasing concerns about a “no-deal” Brexit.

Ireland’s foreign minister, Simon Coveney, said on Monday that any deal would now “take a bit more time than many people had hoped.” The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, said that while she had been “very hopeful” that a deal on Britain’s exit could be largely achieved this week, “at the moment it actually looks a bit more difficult.”

Little progress this week may also put in question plans for a possible emergency summit meeting in mid-November — another opportunity to seal a Brexit deal. President Emmanuel Macron of France has said he will not attend one unless significant progress is made this week.

The Irish prime minister, Leo Varadkar, said a deal with Britain was now more likely to be struck in November or December.

European governments in general are rather fed up with Britain and Mrs. May’s seeming incapacity to control her own cabinet or command a majority in Parliament for her plans. But they are trying not to force her into a position that would lead her to feel the need to call a new election or that would cause her party to dump her.

And the Europeans have other pressing issues on their minds.

The summit is scheduled to begin with a dinner on Wednesday to discuss the Brexit issue, with Mrs. May invited at least for part of the meal. That will be followed by discussion on Thursday among the rest of the leaders on issues that are of more urgency to them, including migration, internal security and the challenge to the union presented by the governments of Italy, Poland and Hungary.

Some European officials think that an agreement with Britain might only be reached in December, if it happens at all, given that negotiations tend to get serious only in the face of real deadlines.

While European officials want a smooth Brexit and are willing to put off dealing with some of the issues that are the most contentious in Britain, they are also going to be more loyal to a member in good standing, Ireland, than to a country, no matter how important, that has chosen to leave.

One of Dublin’s main concerns is the avoidance of border controls, which both sides have vowed to avoid, to protect the hard-won peace on the island.

Mrs. May believes that a deal on future trade with the European Union can be comprehensive enough to remove the need for border checks in Ireland, but the European Union has demanded a “backstop” plan in case that cannot be put into effect in time.

For this interim period Mrs. May has proposed keeping the whole of the United Kingdom under European Union customs rules and accepting some more regulatory checks on the transit of goods between mainland Britain and Northern Ireland.

But negotiators are stuck on legal issues and on when and how this arrangement would end. That has prompted the idea of “a backstop to the backstop.” That final backstop would keep Northern Ireland alone in a customs union, and would come into effect if a future trade deal making border checks unnecessary could not be finished.

On Monday, Mrs. May said again that she could not accept anything that would see Northern Ireland “carved off in the E.U.’s customs union and parts of the single market, separated through a border in the Irish Sea from the U.K.’s own internal market.”