May to discuss Brexit terms with EU
Leaders pushing U.K. to make plans on trade
BRUSSELS — British Prime Minister Theresa May acknowledged Thursday that Brexit negotiations need to speed up, as European Union leaders said a deal is at risk if the British government doesn’t overcome its divisions and decide what kind of ties it wants with the bloc once it leaves.
Britain’s looming exit is a side dish at an EU summit in Brussels, where the top priority is stemming a political crisis over migration that is shaking European unity and undermining German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government.
May has been given a slot over dinner to update the 27 other EU leaders on U.K. departure plans. The EU nations will assess progress in the bloc’s divorce negotiations Friday, without May.
The talks have stalled amid divisions within May’s government about how close an economic relationship to seek with the EU after Brexit. The British leader is caught between pro-eu parliamentarians who want to retain close economic ties with Britain’s biggest trading partner, and pro-brexit lawmakers who want a clean break so Britain can strike new trade deals around the world.
So far May has fudged the issue, saying the U.K. will quit the bloc’s single market and tariff-free customs union but will seek trade that is “as free and frictionless as possible.”
Next week May will gather her fractious Cabinet at Chequers, the prime minister’s country retreat, to try to draw up a united plan for future trade and security ties with the EU.
Arriving at the Brussels summit, May insisted there had been “very good progress” in negotiations.
But, she added: “I think both sides are keen to continue that work at a faster pace than we have done up till now.”
EU officials have warned that the timetable the two sides have set themselves — to reach a divorce agreement by October so that EU national parliaments can ratify it before Britain officially leaves the bloc in March — is slipping out of reach.
“We did expect that we would make more progress — or any progress, really,” Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said. “What I will be saying to Prime Minister May is that we all have to intensify our efforts now. All of us want a deal.”