EU rejects UK plea to allow asylum seeker returns after Brexit
Britain is set to lose its power to send asylum seekers back to other EU countries after the Brexit transition period ends, throwing the government's immigration policy into disarray.
EU negotiators have reportedly rejected UK requests for a new agreement to replicate the Dublin Regulations, which bind EU member states to process certain asylum claims at the request of their neighbours.
The provision is used regularly by the UK to turn back refugees arriving on the south coast after travelling overland through France and other European countries.
Michel Barnier is expected to elaborate on the situation on Friday, which has moved into the spotlight after an up-tick in the number of dinghies landing on the Kent coast in recent months.
Time-wasting UK makes post-Brexit deal unlikely, says EU chief
With barely two months to go until the EU-imposed deadline of late October for a deal, the EU’s chief negotiator said: “Frankly I am disappointed and I am worried.” Barnier added he was “a little surprised” because Boris Johnson had told EU leaders earlier this summer he wanted progress by July.
After two days of talks with the British, Barnier said: “Too often this week it felt as if we were going backwards more than forwards.” At this stage an agreement seemed “unlikely”, he said. “I simply do not understand why we are wasting valuable time.”
Would you really want it any other way? How quaint to think that, once upon a time, this kind of thing used to be maddening. Now it serves as a comforting reminder of times past.
Absolutely zero advancement in the Brexit talks is the only constant in our lives. Once upon a time, Britain’s Trident submarine commanders were instructed to listen out for the BBC World Service, and if it could not be picked up, it was reasonable to assume the country no longer existed, and it would be up to them to retaliate.
We know where we are with Brexit, which has already become a kind of I Love the 2016s late-night Channel 5 nostalgia fest, in which the last 19 remaining members of Goldie Lookin Chain sit in front of a green screen background spitting scripted lols about the “Breaking Point” poster.
The never-ending Brexit s**tshow is all so reassuringly familiar, even though the curtain still hasn’t actually gone up.
Back when we chose to shoot ourselves in the foot, shooting oneself in the foot was considered a stupid thing to do. Now, it’s barely worth even worrying about. From the range of available options these days, you’d probably take it.
Michel Barnier gave a press conference saying he was “disappointed and surprised” by the lack of progress, as he has done almost every month since he was appointed the European Union’s chief Brexit negotiator, shortly after the 1815 Congress of Vienna, when he was just 28 years old.
His UK counterpart, David Frost, doesn’t give press conferences. Instead, he issues statements, then holds anonymous conference calls with journalists on which the things he says cannot be attributed to him. This is the Johnson-Cummings method: blatant untruths can be namelessly inserted into the general information ecosystem, for which no one can ever actually be held accountable, because no one ever actually said them.
The last time anyone from the UK government gave an actual press conference about Brexit was on 24 January, when Boris Johnson went to Brussels to sign his “oven-ready” deal, for which it turns out the oven is not ready.
The UK’s current strategy is to make unreasonable demands then brand the EU unreasonable. All Frost can ever say is that all he is asking for is the same terms the EU has given to Canada, Japan and various others with whom it has signed a free trade agreement.
And all Barnier can ever point out is that the UK is not Canada, is not Japan. This time, he explained that the UK won’t sign up to EU standards on haulage, won’t have EU tachographs fitted, won’t obey rules on working hours, it just wants to make its own rules then come into the EU and do its own thing, undercutting EU businesses, and can’t understand why the EU isn’t having it.
Because trade still remains all about proximity, and it will always be so. It is why the UK does more trade with Belgium than it does with China, and it is why the ever-unquotable Frost is talking disingenuous garbage when he says that all the UK wants is a simple free trade agreement and the EU won’t do it.
Johnson and co still want to have their cake and eat it. Failing that, they want to blame the EU for the straightforward impossibility of their being able to deliver on the lies they told four years and a hundred thousand lifetimes ago.
And when it all goes wrong, will anyone even care?
Michael Barnier: Valuable time 'wasted' in EU-UK trade talks
The chances of a post–Brexit trade deal between the EU and UK “seems unlikely”, the EU’s chief negotiator has said after the latest round of talks.
Michel Barnier said he did not understand why they were “wasting valuable time” and it felt like the two sides were “‘going backwards, more than forwards".
But he said there had been “progress on technical issues”
The dossier of doom: Leaked Cabinet Office papers suggest No Deal Brexit combined with a winter second wave of coronavirus could lead to a food and fuel crisis
Leaked official papers from Boris Johnson's (pictured left) government will heap pressure on ministers to prepare the NHS and strike a deal with the EU. Talks with the Union have stagnated with Michel Barnier warning a deal now seems unlikely. It is feared that hospitals could be overwhelmed if restrictions on trade sparked by a No Deal scenario are combined with floods, flu and Covid 19. There may also be power and fuel shortages if thousands of lorries get stuck at Dover (top right). No Deal could lead to shortages of the 30 per cent of the nation's food that is imported from the EU (bottom right). Marked 'Official Sensitive', the plans - which account for a 'worst case scenario' - include the Royal Navy having to protect UK fishing boats from foreign incursions. The Cabinet Office's EU transition taskforce presented the blueprint to ministers and officials amid warnings that negotiations with Brussels are 'frozen'.
My blue passport has arrived – and with it a crushing new sense of our Brexit nightmare
Yet by far the worst thing about it was my own photo, as ever, contriving to look meaner and more like Myra Hindley than the last, which was itself the worst picture I had ever taken. Remarkably, and powerfully, this lifted my spirits. Some things never change. Every passport has a worse photo than the last – even, mysteriously, one you lost after only six months. But everything else can change, and who knows, by 2030, the blue years could be over.
Germany scraps plans for Brexit talks at EU ambassadors summit
Germany has scrapped plans to discuss Brexit at a high-level diplomatic meeting next week because there has not been “any tangible progress” in talks, the Guardian has learned, as Brussels laments a “completely wasted” summer.
EU officials now believe the UK government is prepared to risk a no-deal exit when the transition period comes to an end on 31 December, and will try to pin the blame on Brussels if talks fail.
The German government, which holds the rotating presidency of the EU council, had intended to discuss Brexit during a meeting of EU ambassadors on 2 September but has now dropped the issue. “Since there hasn’t been any tangible progress in EU-UK negotiations, the Brexit item was taken off the agenda,” an EU diplomat said.
The lead in the Guardian is "Germany scraps Brexit talks after wasted summer of no progress". It suggests the Germans have abandoned plans to discuss Britain's departure at a diplomatic meeting next week. The paper explains that the decision matters because German Chancellor Angela Merkel "was billed as a potential dealmaker when talks on the future UK-EU relationship reach a crucial stage this autumn".
Barnier 'flabbergasted' at UK attempt to reopen Brexit specialty food debate
The UK government has renewed its attempt to reopen the chapter of the Brexit divorce treaty protecting specialty food and drink, such as Parma ham, roquefort cheese and champagne, in a move that left the EU chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, “a little bit flabbergasted”.
The British proposal on protected status for food and drink was included in a draft free-trade agreement handed to Barnier by his opposite number, David Frost, last week, according to two EU sources.
But EU officials have ruled out diluting the divorce deal provisions that protect more than 3,000 high-end food and drink products from copycats. “It’s just not going to happen,” said one official.
The withdrawal agreement signed between Boris Johnson and EU leaders last October preserves the status of food and drink protected under the EU’s geographical indications (GI) policy. A top priority for EU trade negotiators, these rules bar English or Spanish vintners from calling their sparkling wine champagne, for example, while only crumbly cheese from Greece can be labelled feta. Under the withdrawal treaty, the protection applies “unless and until” a new deal can be negotiated.
According to EU sources, the UK is attempting to water down protection for EU geographical indications, while keeping the special status for British produce, such as Scotch whisky, Melton Mowbray pork pies and Cornish pasties.
The return of the proposal, floated in the early stages of trade talks last spring, caused astonishment. “The asymmetry was met with open mouths. Why would you even suggest that in a serious negotiation?” said the EU source. Barnier was “a little bit flabbergasted”, the person added.
Captainless WTO in troubled water with no land in sight
As Roberto Azevedo leaves the World Trade Organization Monday, the institution faces multiple crises without a captain -- a situation experts warn could drag on for months.
Any future WTO leader will head an organisation mired in stalled trade talks and struggling to curb trade tensions between the United States and China.
It must also help member countries navigate a devastating global economic slump sparked by the coronavirus pandemic.
The global trade body faces relentless attacks from Washington, which has crippled the WTO dispute settlement appeal system and threatened to leave altogether.
Many observers fear that intransigent US positions could paralyse the WTO process of designating a new director general, leaving the organisation leaderless for the foreseeable future.
Members failed last month to pick an acting chief from among four deputy directors -- something that is normally a straightforward process.
Comments
EU rejects UK plea to allow asylum seeker returns after Brexit
Britain is set to lose its power to send asylum seekers back to other EU countries after the Brexit transition period ends, throwing the government's immigration policy into disarray.
EU negotiators have reportedly rejected UK requests for a new agreement to replicate the Dublin Regulations, which bind EU member states to process certain asylum claims at the request of their neighbours.
The provision is used regularly by the UK to turn back refugees arriving on the south coast after travelling overland through France and other European countries.
Michel Barnier is expected to elaborate on the situation on Friday, which has moved into the spotlight after an up-tick in the number of dinghies landing on the Kent coast in recent months.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/eu-rejects-uk-plea-to-allow-asylum-seeker-returns-after-brexit/ar-BB18c7C5?ocid=msedgntp
With barely two months to go until the EU-imposed deadline of late October for a deal, the EU’s chief negotiator said: “Frankly I am disappointed and I am worried.” Barnier added he was “a little surprised” because Boris Johnson had told EU leaders earlier this summer he wanted progress by July.
After two days of talks with the British, Barnier said: “Too often this week it felt as if we were going backwards more than forwards.” At this stage an agreement seemed “unlikely”, he said. “I simply do not understand why we are wasting valuable time.”
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/brexit/time-wasting-uk-makes-post-brexit-deal-unlikely-says-eu-chief/ar-BB18e65t
If in fact it ever existed, other than in the mind of our leader.
You have to admire his optimism, he has rowed back on much of the stuff that was agreed, and he still expects them to sort out our migrant problem.
We have told them to F. Off, but he expects them to allow us to drop any migrants that arrive, back over to them.
Boris Johnson's ‘oven-ready’ Brexit deal has gone off, and it’s the oven’s fault
Boris Johnson, Michel Barnier are posing for a picture© Provided by The Independent
No progress, then, in the latest round of Brexit talks, with both sides blaming the other.
Would you really want it any other way? How quaint to think that, once upon a time, this kind of thing used to be maddening. Now it serves as a comforting reminder of times past.
Absolutely zero advancement in the Brexit talks is the only constant in our lives. Once upon a time, Britain’s Trident submarine commanders were instructed to listen out for the BBC World Service, and if it could not be picked up, it was reasonable to assume the country no longer existed, and it would be up to them to retaliate.
We know where we are with Brexit, which has already become a kind of I Love the 2016s late-night Channel 5 nostalgia fest, in which the last 19 remaining members of Goldie Lookin Chain sit in front of a green screen background spitting scripted lols about the “Breaking Point” poster.
The never-ending Brexit s**tshow is all so reassuringly familiar, even though the curtain still hasn’t actually gone up.
Back when we chose to shoot ourselves in the foot, shooting oneself in the foot was considered a stupid thing to do. Now, it’s barely worth even worrying about. From the range of available options these days, you’d probably take it.
Michel Barnier gave a press conference saying he was “disappointed and surprised” by the lack of progress, as he has done almost every month since he was appointed the European Union’s chief Brexit negotiator, shortly after the 1815 Congress of Vienna, when he was just 28 years old.
His UK counterpart, David Frost, doesn’t give press conferences. Instead, he issues statements, then holds anonymous conference calls with journalists on which the things he says cannot be attributed to him. This is the Johnson-Cummings method: blatant untruths can be namelessly inserted into the general information ecosystem, for which no one can ever actually be held accountable, because no one ever actually said them.
The last time anyone from the UK government gave an actual press conference about Brexit was on 24 January, when Boris Johnson went to Brussels to sign his “oven-ready” deal, for which it turns out the oven is not ready.
The UK’s current strategy is to make unreasonable demands then brand the EU unreasonable. All Frost can ever say is that all he is asking for is the same terms the EU has given to Canada, Japan and various others with whom it has signed a free trade agreement.
And all Barnier can ever point out is that the UK is not Canada, is not Japan. This time, he explained that the UK won’t sign up to EU standards on haulage, won’t have EU tachographs fitted, won’t obey rules on working hours, it just wants to make its own rules then come into the EU and do its own thing, undercutting EU businesses, and can’t understand why the EU isn’t having it.
Because trade still remains all about proximity, and it will always be so. It is why the UK does more trade with Belgium than it does with China, and it is why the ever-unquotable Frost is talking disingenuous garbage when he says that all the UK wants is a simple free trade agreement and the EU won’t do it.
Johnson and co still want to have their cake and eat it. Failing that, they want to blame the EU for the straightforward impossibility of their being able to deliver on the lies they told four years and a hundred thousand lifetimes ago.
And when it all goes wrong, will anyone even care?
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/boris-johnson-s-oven-ready-brexit-deal-has-gone-off-and-it-s-the-oven-s-fault/ar-BB18epeh
The chances of a post–Brexit trade deal between the EU and UK “seems unlikely”, the EU’s chief negotiator has said after the latest round of talks.
Michel Barnier said he did not understand why they were “wasting valuable time” and it felt like the two sides were “‘going backwards, more than forwards".
But he said there had been “progress on technical issues”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-53862813
Leaked official papers from Boris Johnson's (pictured left) government will heap pressure on ministers to prepare the NHS and strike a deal with the EU. Talks with the Union have stagnated with Michel Barnier warning a deal now seems unlikely. It is feared that hospitals could be overwhelmed if restrictions on trade sparked by a No Deal scenario are combined with floods, flu and Covid 19. There may also be power and fuel shortages if thousands of lorries get stuck at Dover (top right). No Deal could lead to shortages of the 30 per cent of the nation's food that is imported from the EU (bottom right). Marked 'Official Sensitive', the plans - which account for a 'worst case scenario' - include the Royal Navy having to protect UK fishing boats from foreign incursions. The Cabinet Office's EU transition taskforce presented the blueprint to ministers and officials amid warnings that negotiations with Brussels are 'frozen'.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8656895/Dossier-Doom-No-Deal-Covid-lead-food-fuel-crisis-leaked-papers-reveal.html
Yet by far the worst thing about it was my own photo, as ever, contriving to look meaner and more like Myra Hindley than the last, which was itself the worst picture I had ever taken. Remarkably, and powerfully, this lifted my spirits. Some things never change. Every passport has a worse photo than the last – even, mysteriously, one you lost after only six months. But everything else can change, and who knows, by 2030, the blue years could be over.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/my-blue-passport-has-arrived-and-with-it-a-crushing-new-sense-of-our-brexit-nightmare/ar-BB18ibqy
Germany has scrapped plans to discuss Brexit at a high-level diplomatic meeting next week because there has not been “any tangible progress” in talks, the Guardian has learned, as Brussels laments a “completely wasted” summer.
EU officials now believe the UK government is prepared to risk a no-deal exit when the transition period comes to an end on 31 December, and will try to pin the blame on Brussels if talks fail.
The German government, which holds the rotating presidency of the EU council, had intended to discuss Brexit during a meeting of EU ambassadors on 2 September but has now dropped the issue. “Since there hasn’t been any tangible progress in EU-UK negotiations, the Brexit item was taken off the agenda,” an EU diplomat said.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/germany-scraps-plans-brexit-talks-172112053.html
The lead in the Guardian is "Germany scraps Brexit talks after wasted summer of no progress". It suggests the Germans have abandoned plans to discuss Britain's departure at a diplomatic meeting next week.
The paper explains that the decision matters because German Chancellor Angela Merkel "was billed as a potential dealmaker when talks on the future UK-EU relationship reach a crucial stage this autumn".
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-the-papers-53927195
The UK government has renewed its attempt to reopen the chapter of the Brexit divorce treaty protecting specialty food and drink, such as Parma ham, roquefort cheese and champagne, in a move that left the EU chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, “a little bit flabbergasted”.
The British proposal on protected status for food and drink was included in a draft free-trade agreement handed to Barnier by his opposite number, David Frost, last week, according to two EU sources.
But EU officials have ruled out diluting the divorce deal provisions that protect more than 3,000 high-end food and drink products from copycats. “It’s just not going to happen,” said one official.
The withdrawal agreement signed between Boris Johnson and EU leaders last October preserves the status of food and drink protected under the EU’s geographical indications (GI) policy. A top priority for EU trade negotiators, these rules bar English or Spanish vintners from calling their sparkling wine champagne, for example, while only crumbly cheese from Greece can be labelled feta. Under the withdrawal treaty, the protection applies “unless and until” a new deal can be negotiated.
According to EU sources, the UK is attempting to water down protection for EU geographical indications, while keeping the special status for British produce, such as Scotch whisky, Melton Mowbray pork pies and Cornish pasties.
The return of the proposal, floated in the early stages of trade talks last spring, caused astonishment. “The asymmetry was met with open mouths. Why would you even suggest that in a serious negotiation?” said the EU source. Barnier was “a little bit flabbergasted”, the person added.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/barnier-flabbergasted-uk-attempt-reopen-135833011.html
As Roberto Azevedo leaves the World Trade Organization Monday, the institution faces multiple crises without a captain -- a situation experts warn could drag on for months.
Any future WTO leader will head an organisation mired in stalled trade talks and struggling to curb trade tensions between the United States and China.
It must also help member countries navigate a devastating global economic slump sparked by the coronavirus pandemic.
The global trade body faces relentless attacks from Washington, which has crippled the WTO dispute settlement appeal system and threatened to leave altogether.
Many observers fear that intransigent US positions could paralyse the WTO process of designating a new director general, leaving the organisation leaderless for the foreseeable future.
Members failed last month to pick an acting chief from among four deputy directors -- something that is normally a straightforward process.
https://uk.yahoo.com/news/captainless-wto-troubled-water-no-022400544.html