There is "no reason today for optimism" in the Brexit talks, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier said, while warning that the next stage of negotiations after a UK departure from the EU would be even harder.
Speaking about progress in the negotiations at a summit of German media publishers in Berlin, he gave a downbeat assessment and warned that resolving the dispute over how to manage the border on the island of Ireland is only one of two problems in the Brexit negotiations.
The second would be clearing a future free-trade agreement and deals covering everything from aviation to fisheries and student exchange programs through the bloc's legislatures. “Each and every one of these arrangements will require ratification by the 27 member states, and even some regions if you remember what happened with CETA," said Barnier, referring to the EU-Canada trade deal almost scotched by lawmakers in the French-speaking region of Belgium.
"Don’t underestimate the difficulty of ratification," said Barnier.
He said the EU will push in trade talks to make sure that standards on everything from environmental protection to state aid remain comparable to avoid giving Britain a competitive edge.
"The U.K. and EU will remain neighbors and our companies will continue to compete with each other. Let me be simple and clear, this competition must be fair. The level of ambition of our future FTA [free-trade agreement] will clearly depend on [that]," he said.
On the state of current talks, which U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said last week were making "huge progress," Barnier gave a very different assessment. "I see no reason today for optimism." But he added that "work will continue at a technical level over the next days." [...]
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