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Brexit: Angela Merkel insists Article 50 must be triggered before Brexit talks despite Theresa May stance Angela Merkel insists Article 50 must be triggered before Brexit talks despite Theresa May stance
(35 minutes later)
Angela Merkel has insisted talks over the UK's exit from the European Union cannot begin until Article 50 is invoked. Whatever it was that Prime Minister May came to Berlin hoping to get, she will leave without it. The message from Chancellor Merkel was clear: If you wish to take your time over leaving the European Union, then do, but don’t expect anything in the meantime.
Speaking at a joint news conference as she and British Prime Minister Theresa May met, she said: "We will wait for the moment when the UK invokes [Article 50] and then we will put our guidelines on the table." Never before have two more powerful stateswomen met for bilateral discussions, but those discussions were defined by what was off the table, rather than what was on it.
Ms Merkel said that Britain should be clear about what kind of relationship it wants to have with the European Union before starting talks on quitting the bloc. At a joint press conference with the two leaders at the German Chancellery, Ms Merkel repeatedly made clear that Germany will not enter into any discussions with the UK until it invokes Article 50, and formally begins the two year process of leaving the EU.
“From my point of view it's completely understandable that a few days after the referendum, a few days after a new government in Great Britain is formed, that the government has to first think what are our interests, what exactly do they look like,” Merkel said at a joint news conference in Berlin with visiting British Prime Minister Theresa May. In recent weeks Ms Merkel has been more patient with the UK than other European leaders have been, who have called on the UK to invoke Article 50 immediately, but her position was no less decisive.
“And I think it's in all of our interests if Great Britain has a very well defined negotiating position,” Ms Merkel added. “The people in the majority in the UK voted for leaving,” she said. “We have not asked them to leave. I think it’s understandable that a new government will have to take a moment and seek to identify its interests. So we will wait for the moment when the UK invokes this and applies for this and then we will put our guidelines on the table as to how we see the future relationship.”
The German Chancellor said the close bond between the UK and Germany would continue “irrespective” of the vote to leave the EU. Article 50 is designed to give the EU the upper hand over an exiting member state. The two year deadline serves as a ticking clock, weakening the leaving country’s position. It would be in the UK’s interests to be given informal guidance on what position Germany might take in negotiations with it, prior to Article 50 being triggered. Ms Merkel will not be doing so.
“Irrespective of the decision that the people in the UK have taken to leave the EU, we are linked by very close bonds of friendship, of partnership,” she said. “The British Prime Minister will not sit at the table of the European Council. It doesn’t make sense now to engage in speculation in what might happen. 27 countries will be giving you different views. That’s not in the British interest. And it’s not in our interest.”
“Our two countries have always acted on a basis of very clear and firm and similar convictions. We share the same values.” Despite years at the top of politics, the meeting was the first time the two women had ever met.
Both nations were members of Nato, the G20 and G7 and “this will determine the relationship and also the spirit in which we will carry out the negotiations on the UK leaving the EU”. Ms May said: “We have two women here, who have had a very constructive discussion, who get on with the job and want to deliver the best results for the people of the UK and the people of Germany.”
“Independently of this process of leaving the EU, we want to also continue to foster our relations on the economic field, in the political fiel,d because this is, after all, in our mutual interest," Ms Merkel said. Asked by a German journalist whether the appointment of Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary was “like putting a player on the pitch who doesn’t want to play,” Ms May said: “I have appointed a team of ministers, and we will be looking to build good relations. Those positive relations will underpin everything I do.”
Mrs May insited that Brexit would not mean “walking away from our European friends” and that the UK would remain an “outward-looking country” after the European Union referendum result.
She said: “I have been clear that Brexit means Brexit and the United Kingdom is going to make a success of it.
“But I also want to be clear here today, and across Europe in the weeks ahead, that we are not walking away from our European friends.
Mrs May confirmed she would not trigger the two-year Article 50 process of leaving the European Union before the end of the year.
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