Will the United Kingdom contest the divorce agreement with the European Union (EU) signed at the end of 2019, when it has the value of an international treaty and it is the British themselves who invented the concept? of rule of law, or the primacy of the rule of law over politics? This is the red line that Boris Johnson’s government seems ready to cross, despite protests from its European partners, its political opponents and even some figures from the Conservative Party.
Tuesday, September 8, in the House of Commons, Brandon Lewis, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, said, about provisions concerning Belfast supposed to be in a bill presented Wednesday (on the internal market British), that they “Infringed[aient] or potentially could violate international law, but in a specific and limited way ”. The government intends introduce “A safety net” in order to “To be able to keep our commitments vis-à-vis the North Irish” and “Protect huge gains” the Good Friday Agreement – which ended the civil war in 1998 -, Lewis said.
The matter is complex but extremely sensitive, in Brussels as in Dublin: a joint committee (made up of British and Europeans) was tasked in early 2020 to set the practical details of the divorce treaty (the Withdrawal Agreement Bill), approved by hard fight at the end of 2019, in particular its Irish section, designed to avoid the return of a “hard” border after Brexit between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.
UK reputation at risk
In particular, the state aid regime applying to Belfast and the levels of customs controls to be subject to goods transiting from Great Britain to Northern Ireland must be specified. Knowing that the latter, as agreed in the divorce treaty, will remain both aligned with European standards set within the framework of the Community internal market and will be part of the British customs union.
London says it wants to deal with any eventuality: if this joint committee does not reach an agreement at the end of 2020, the British government provides in its bill that its ministers can decide unilaterally on state aid and customs controls. These intentions, in obvious contradiction with the divorce treaty, were revealed by the Financial Times from Sunday and caused the resignation of Jonathan Jones, the highest official in the British administration, responsible for legal affairs, on Tuesday morning.
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