Exclusive: Paris shelved plans to ban UK boats from French ports following last-ditch talks
France backed down on its threats to clog up British trade and ban UK fishers from its ports after Jersey offered to expedite approval for “five or six” new fishing vessels in its waters.
Ian Gorst, Jersey’s minister for external affairs, said the offer from his administration and the UK government had proven to be a “good way to move things forward”.
Continue reading...Exclusive: high representative says threat by Serb separatists to create their own army risks return of conflict
The international community’s chief representative in Bosnia has warned that the country is in imminent danger of breaking apart, and there is a “very real” prospect of a return to conflict.
In a report to the UN seen by the Guardian, Christian Schmidt, the high representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, said that if Serb separatists carry out their threat to recreate their own army, splitting the national armed forces in two, more international peacekeepers would have to be sent back in to stop the slide towards a new war.
Continue reading...Officials from France and UK to meet in Brussels after threats from both sides in post-Brexit dispute
Jersey has issued another 49 licences to French boats in an apparent attempt to de-escalate a post-Brexit row over fishing rights in which the UK and France have issued tit-for-tat threats.
The Jersey government said it was allowing another round of temporary licences until the end of January to allow time for new arrangements to be put in place, as the two sides prepared to meet to try to resolve the row.
Continue reading...At the heart of the row is the Brexit deal’s failure to spell out what proof French fishers need to get a permit
Britain and France have been at loggerheads over post-Brexit fishing licences for UK waters since the start of the year. Both sides are now threatening imminent action – and mistranslations have not helped.
Continue reading...No 10 says ‘our stance has not changed’ after French officials state Macron and Johnson found path to de-escalating dispute
A dispute between the UK and France over post-Brexit fishing rights has escalated significantly after a meeting between Boris Johnson and Emmanuel Macron, with Downing Street rejecting a French claim that the two leaders had agreed a path towards resolving the issue.
Johnson and the French president met alone for half an hour on Sunday morning on the fringes of the G20 summit in Rome, where they discussed the fishing row, as well as tensions over Northern Ireland and this week’s Cop26 climate summit.
Continue reading...Scientists and experts in despair over fishing row, as prime minister declares summit will be ‘world’s moment of truth’
Leading scientists and environmentalists called on Boris Johnson and Emmanuel Macron to declare an immediate ceasefire in a bitter Anglo-French row over fishing rights on Saturday as fears grew that the UK’s arguments with its EU neighbours could overshadow the crucial Cop26 summit on climate change.
On the eve of the UK hosting 120 world leaders at the meeting in Glasgow, the prime minister said the summit would be “the world’s moment of truth” and could mark “the beginning of the end of climate change”. Speaking at a meeting of G20 leaders in Rome, he added: “The question everyone is asking is whether we seize this moment or let it slip away.”
Continue reading...Chris Riddell on ghouls, Brexit and the budget
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Continue reading...French and EU vessels could face ‘rigorous checks’ in British waters if Paris carries out threats
Boris Johnson vowed to do “whatever is necessary” to protect British fishers, with French and EU vessels put on notice of “rigorous” checks when in British waters and even tariffs on goods if Paris acts on its recent threats.
As France prepared to act on its plan to tie up British goods in red tape at ports in a row over fishing licences, the prime minister said he intended to ask Emmanuel Macron to see past the “turbulence” in British-French relations.
Continue reading...Analysis: British government is not entirely innocent but Paris knows forceful rhetoric should only go so far
In January 2017, Emmanuel Macron, in third place in the race to be the next president of France and seen by some as an electoral bubble waiting to burst, staged a photo opportunity in the fish market of Le Guilvinec in Brittany. “Brexit will not go well because Brexit cannot go well,” Macron told fishers who had raised their concerns about the future. “But I’ll make [the fishing problem] a red line in our negotiations with the UK.”
Macron’s seizing of the Élysée Palace later that year was hugely buoyed up by the turnout in the coastal region. Close to a third of voters in Brittany gave him their vote in the crucial first round of the 2017 contest, a greater proportion than in any other region of France.
Continue reading...UK environment secretary accuses France of using ‘inflammatory’ rhetoric in escalating dispute
Emmanuel Macron’s hopes of being re-elected president may be driving the diplomatic row with France over post-Brexit access to Britain’s fishing waters, the UK’s environment secretary has claimed.
George Eustice accused Paris of using “inflammatory” rhetoric in an escalating dispute over a shortfall in licences for French fishing vessels seeking to operate in the coastal waters of the UK and Jersey.
Continue reading...Countries must close gap on funding target for developing countries says European Commission president
The European Commission president has urged wealthy countries to close the gap to meet a $100bn annual climate finance target for developing nations a year earlier than expected.
Speaking before crucial meetings on the climate emergency at the G20, and at the UN Cop26 talks, the president, Ursula von der Leyen, said rich countries had “to try harder” to close the shortfall in climate finance.
Continue reading...Comments from French EU affairs minister come as British trawler is detained in France amid dispute
France will “now use the language of force” in an escalation of a row over post-Brexit fishing rights, France’s EU affairs minister has said, as French maritime police seized a British trawler found in its territorial waters without a licence.
One vessel was stopped off Le Havre in the early hours of Thursday morning, then rerouted to the quay and “handed over to the judicial authority”, while a second was given a verbal warning.
Continue reading...No 10 threatens retaliation against French measures including port ban on British fishing boats
A major trade dispute has broken out between the UK and France after Paris banned British fishing boats from key ports, vowed to impose onerous checks on cross-Channel trade, and threatened the UK’s energy supply over a row over post-Brexit rights to UK waters.
The move prompted a dramatic response from Downing Street where a spokesperson for Boris Johnson said the UK government would retaliate over what was a described as a potential breach of international law.
Continue reading...Warsaw calls European court of justice move blackmail and says penalties ‘not the right road’
Poland has been fined €1m (£845,000) a day by the European court of justice for ignoring a ruling that it must suspend its controversial judicial system changes.
The inflammatory move, which runs contrary to recent words of caution from the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, was immediately denounced in Warsaw as “blackmail”.
Continue reading...Minister ‘quite concerned’ about delay to finalising UK’s participation in €80bn Horizon Europe scheme
A fresh Brexit row has been blown open with Brussels after David Frost accused the EU of being close to breaching the trade deal struck last Christmas.
He said the UK was “getting quite concerned” about Brussels delaying ratification of the UK’s participation in the €80bn (£67bn) Horizon Europe research programme, costing British scientists their place in pan-European research programmes.
Continue reading...Government sources say talks with EU ‘constructive’ but ‘we are still far apart on big issues’
The UK government has described talks with the EU over the Northern Ireland Brexit protocol as “constructive” but insisted it was not about to cave in on its demands that the role of the European court of justice be scrapped.
Government sources dampened hopes of a breakthrough, saying the two sides were still “far apart on the big issues”.
Continue reading...Angela Merkel, the outgoing chancellor of Germany, seemed wary of offering her hand for a full handshake with the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, at a Brussels summit. Von der Leyen instead grasped Merkel's hand by way of greeting, at what could be her compatriot's final EU summit as chancellor
Continue reading...German chancellor offers olive branch to Warsaw at what may prove to be her last EU summit
Angela Merkel, who earlier this week reflected on her deep hurt over Brexit, has called for European Union countries to compromise over their competing visions of integration, at what was being billed in Brussels as a farewell summit for the German chancellor.
The attempt by Merkel, at her 107th and possibly final EU summit, to smooth over a dispute over Poland’s rejection of European court of justice rulings, in an olive branch to Warsaw, came as the Dutch prime minister, Mark Rutte, demanded tough action, and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán rallied to the defence of the Polish government.
Continue reading...Mateusz Morawiecki says European court’s ‘creeping revolution’ undermines Polish sovereignty
Poland’s prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, has clashed with the European Commission president and MEPs after accusing EU institutions of seeking to turn the country into a province, in an escalation of the battle between Warsaw and Brussels over the rule of law.
During a heated debate in the European parliament in Strasbourg, where parallels between the Polish situation and Brexit were raised repeatedly by MEPs, Morawiecki claimed the European court of justice (ECJ) was responsible for a “creeping revolution” undermining Poland’s sovereignty.
Continue reading...Social network says it wants to ensure virtual world is built responsibly
Facebook is creating 10,000 jobs in the EU as part of its push to build a virtual world for its users.
The company has trumpeted the “metaverse” as the next big phase of growth for large tech companies and recently announced a $50m (£36m) investment programme to ensure that this metaworld is built “responsibly”.
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