Brussels will have to terminate the UK’s extended membership of the European Union on 1 July if elections for British MEPs have not been held, a leaked legal document reveals.
A three-month delay to Brexit beyond 29 March will not carry any conditions, but anything longer than that requires Britain to have taken part in European parliamentary elections, ambassadors have been told.
EU law does not stand in the way of multiple extensions to the UK’s membership if requested, the document says. But if elections had not been held in May, and the UK subsequently sought to stay on as a member state to avoid a no-deal Brexit, for example, the EU would be bound to reject a request, the document seen by the Guardian says.
“No extension should be granted beyond 1 July unless the European parliament elections are held at the mandatory date”, the legal opinion shared among ambassadors on Friday says.
The EU would “cease being able to operate in a secure legal context” should there be an extension beyond 1 July and British MEPs had not been elected, it warns.
“All acts of the union that would be adopted with the participation of an irregularly composed parliament would be open to legal challenge on this ground, which would put the security of legal relations in the union seriously at risk,” it says. [...]
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