EU toughens Brexit stance as it prepares for key summit

The EU has hardened its position on Brexit talks ahead of a key summit, making new demands on financial services, immigration and Britain’s exit bill, a document showed Tuesday.

The leaders of the other 27 countries will stress that Britain will be liable for costs for at least a year after it leaves in 2019, according to the draft negotiating guidelines seen by AFP.

They insist that Britain’s huge finance industry must also stick to EU rules if it wants easy access to EU markets.

And Britain should give EU citizens permanent residency after living there for five years, they say, in a challenge for the British government which has vowed to limit immigration.

European diplomats agreed the changes on Monday at a meeting with the bloc’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, ahead of Saturday’s Brussels summit where EU leaders will approve “red lines” for two years of tough negotiations.

The leaders are also expect- ed to have a “wider debate on Brexit and the upcoming talks” at the summit, a European source told AFP.

The EU’s language has notably toughened from EU President Donald Tusk’s first draft, issued two days after British Prime Minister Theresa May triggered the divorce process on March 29.

The new harder stance comes as May prepares to hold talks with European Commission chief Jean- Claude Juncker and Barnier in London on Wednesday.

The section on Britain’s divorce bill – estimated by EU sources at 60 billion euros – now adds a mention of “issues resulting from” the bloc’s seven- year budget from 2014 to the end of 2020.

Previously it only mentioned costs up to Britain’s withdrawal in 2019, but the new version spells out the EU belief that Britain is liable for all costs it signed up to while a member.