Brexit breakthrough

EU talks yield agreements; tough stuff ahead

Whether Americans think the United Kingdom leaving the European Union to be a good or a bad development, it is interesting to watch the process unfold. On Friday, the two parties agreed to move from the first phase to the second phase of departure negotiations.

One important element in what is being called a breakthrough in negotiations was agreement that there be no future “hard border” between the Republic of Ireland, which is a member of the EU, and Northern Ireland, a province in the U.K. Northern Ireland will therefore be leaving the EU, even though 56 percent of its voters rejected Brexit in the 2016 referendum. That question was causing some anguish, in both parts of Ireland, the United Kingdom and the United States because it bears on the continued viability of the 1998 Good Friday agreement regarding relations, governance and peace between the Nationalists and Unionists (largely Catholics and Protestants, respectively).

The EU-U.K. decision against a hard border made a lot of sense. Reinstalling one would have involved, in effect, rolling back nearly two decades of constructive cooperation between the two parts of the divided island of Ireland. It was praised by Republic of Ireland Prime Minister Leo Varadkar.

Another sensitive question that has now been resolved is the issue of the rights already existing for the 1 million British citizens now residing in the other 27 EU countries and the 3 million of those countries’ citizens now residing in the United Kingdom. The rights of both groups will continue to be respected in their current countries of residence by both sides as Brexit proceeds. This decision relieves concerns and also stabilizes employment across Europe.

The timetable, according to European Commission head Jean-Claude Juncker and British Prime Minister Theresa May, is that the withdrawal plan will be completed by October 2018 and British withdrawal from the EU by March 2019.

It was stated on Friday that what the United Kingdom would have to pay the EU for debts it is still responsible for had been determined but would not yet be announced. Observers estimate that it will come to between $35 billion and $40 billion. That will remain to be debated in the British Parliament and will no doubt remain a heavy cross for Ms. May and her Conservative Party to bear, because it touches on the continuing question among the British: “Is Brexit worth it?”

It is important that British and EU negotiators have managed to work their way successfully through the first stage of withdrawal, which included some thorny issues. The second stage, which will include contentious trade issues, may be more difficult, and the parties have given themselves less than a year to complete resolving them.

The question of whether the British might still turn back from Brexit lingers, fueled by the fact that the Russians may have interfered with last year’s vote and by the political fragility of Ms. May’s coalition government. The likelihood of that occurring, however, is substantially reduced by the progress on key issues realized and announced by the two parties on Friday and the specifically stated timetable for completion.