THORNTON MANOR, ENGLAND - A Brexit deal
could be clinched by the end of October to allow the United
Kingdom to leave the European Union in an orderly fashion, Irish
Prime Minister Leo Varadkar said after what he called a very
positive meeting with his British counterpart Boris Johnson.
With just three weeks to go before the United Kingdom is due
to leave the world's biggest trading bloc, it is still unclear
on what terms it will leave or indeed whether it will at all.
Johnson met Varadkar at Thornton Manor in Cheshire on
Thursday in a last ditch bid to save a deal and avert an
acrimonious divorce on October 31 or another delay.
"I had a very good meeting with the prime minister... very
positive and very promising," Varadkar told Irish reporters. "I
do see a pathway to an agreement in coming weeks."
"I think it is possible for us to come to an agreement, to
have a treaty agreed, to allow the UK to leave the EU in an
orderly fashion and to have that done by the end of October but
there's many a slip between cup and lip and lots of things that
are not in my control," he said.
In a joint statement, the two leaders said they "could see a
pathway to a possible deal". Johnson did not make any further
comment.
Ireland holds the key to any deal. It will have to consent
to any solution to the hardest Brexit riddle of all: how to
prevent the British province of Northern Ireland becoming a
backdoor into the EU's markets without having border controls.
The EU fears controls on the 500km Irish border
with Northern Ireland would undermine the 1998 Good Friday
Agreement which ended three decades of sectarian and political
conflict that killed over 3600 people.
Although Johnson has insisted Britain that will leave the EU
on October 31 even if no agreement is reached, the British
parliament has passed a law saying he must request a delay.
'Unacceptable demands'
Brexit descended into a public row between London and
Brussels this week after a Downing Street source said a Brexit
deal was essentially impossible because German Chancellor Angela
Merkel had made unacceptable demands.
Ireland is the biggest issue of disagreement.
The Irish border has been largely invisible since army
checkpoints were taken down after the 1998 peace deal largely
ended the violence between the region's pro-British majority and
an Irish nationalist minority.
Politicians have warned that the re-imposition of physical
infrastructure on the border when it becomes the EU's external
frontier would anger Irish nationalists in Northern Ireland who
aspire to unification with the Republic of Ireland, and help
militants opposed to the peace deal to recruit new members.
To get around the problem, the EU agreed an insurance policy
- known as the backstop - last November with Johnson's
predecessor, Theresa May.
The Withdrawal Agreement that May struck says the United
Kingdom will remain in a customs union "unless and until"
alternative arrangements are found to avoid a hard border.
But Johnson has said that was undemocratic, undermined the
unity of the United Kingdom and would keep it trapped in the
EU's orbit for years to come.
Last week he proposed an all-island regulatory zone to cover
all goods. Northern Ireland would leave the EU's customs area
along with the rest of the United Kingdom and the province's
institutions would be able to opt to exit the regulatory zone -
a step too far for Ireland and the EU.
Johnson and Varadkar said they had discussed consent and
customs.
Though Ireland is only about an eighth of the size of the
United Kingdom's $2.8 trillion economy, Dublin is backed by the
rest of the EU whose economy - minus the United Kingdom - is
worth $15.9 trillion.
While Ireland would be very badly affected by a no-deal
Brexit, the relative importance of Ireland in the negotiations
up-ends centuries of history in which it has had a much weaker
hand than London, both before and after winning independence
from Britain.
The EU's two most powerful leaders, Germany's Merkel and
French President Emmanuel Macron, will meet at the Elysee Palace
on Sunday ahead of next week's summit.
"We want to reduce the negative effects, even if there is a
disorderly Brexit, in both countries," Merkel said.
Macron said on Thursday that Britain would have to pay the
price should it decide to proceed with a position over Brexit
that is unacceptable for the other 27 EU countries.
"If they don't want to make any move or make something which
is not accepted, they will have to take the responsibility," he
said.