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During a meeting on Friday in Brussels, the EU’s chief negotiator expressed frustration with the British demands after the latest round of talks. “The UK side keeps on insisting on the same two things,” one EU diplomat said following Barnier’s briefing after the latest week of talks. “And we keep on explaining why it won’t happen.”
But in an interview with the German newspaper Die Welt, Barnier publicly admitted for the first time that he was looking at drafting a joint interpretative instrument as an adjunct to the withdrawal agreement. He also suggested that the parliamentary arithmetic might be moving in the prime minister’s favour.
“We will not allow a time limit or a one-sided exit right,” Barnier told the newspaper. “What can exist is the commitment to limit the backstop through an agreement on the future relationship … in the form of an interpretive document. Like the joint letter from Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker. If this document were combined with a written commitment from the British, then obviously it would have a much greater power.”
It is the first time the EU official has publicly confirmed that such a legal instrument, previously used by the bloc to sweeten deals by offering an optimistic interpretation of terms of draft treaties, was a possibility. [...]