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Some smaller European countries would accept a fudge but the most powerful ones, including Germany, France and Spain, won’t allow it, Josep Borrell said in an interview in Luxembourg Tuesday. He was speaking as May prepares to give more detail on her Brexit objectives -- potentially including membership of the single market for goods -- with businesses warning about loss of access to European markets.
“Germany will say no, France will say no, Spain will say no,” said Borrell, part of a Socialist government that swept to power in Madrid this month. Europe’s largest countries “are quite angry with the United Kingdom -- all this mess, all the trouble created, all this time wasted,” he added.
Borrell’s comments, to Bloomberg News and two European news websites, reflect growing alarm among the EU’s Brexit negotiators that the U.K. thinks it can carve out a deal for membership of the single market in goods, while going it alone in the area of services, an EU official said. The EU will stick to its position that the U.K. can’t cherrypick the parts of the single market it likes, the official said. [...]