EU leaders endorse Brexit deal at special summit – By Sheena McKenzie and James Frater (cnn.com) / Nov 25 2018
Brussels, Belgium (CNN) All 27 remaining European Union leaders signed off Britain’s Brexit deal at a special summit on Sunday — but the real test is yet to come.
Less than an hour after members gathered in Brussels, European Council president Donald Tusk tweeted that they had endorsed the “Withdrawal Agreement and Political Declaration on the future EU-UK relations.”
The agreement is a small victory for British Prime Minister Theresa May, who must now persuade UK Parliament to vote for the deal.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker greet each other in Brussels on Sunday.
Given that opposition parties — not to mention many lawmakers within May’s Conservative party and the Northern Irish DUP, which supports her minority government — have indicated they’ll vote against it, the deal is far from sealed.
Shortly after European leaders endorsed the deal, DUP leader Arlene Foster reiterated that her party “will not be able to support” it, during an interview on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show.
If UK lawmakers do approve the deal, which looks highly doubtful, it will then go to the European Parliament.
But if Westminster stops the deal in its tracks, then Brexit could go a number of ways — including exiting the bloc without a deal at all, or, just possibly, a second referendum that could scrap Brexit altogether.
It would also cast serious doubt on May’s future as prime minister, already under intense scrutiny from Brexiteers within her own party unhappy with what they say is a “soft” exit from European regulations.
At a news conference Sunday, Juncker urged UK Parliament to vote for the deal, likely to happen in December. Pointing his finger in the air for emphasis, Juncker told Westminster: “This is the best thing possible for Britain, the best thing possible for Europe…this is the only deal possible.”
Meanwhile former UK Prime Minister and pro-EU campaigner Tony Blair had a different take, telling the BBC Andrew Marr Show that a second referendum was “the only way you are going to unite the country.”
EU leaders mourn ‘sad day’
The mood among EU leaders gathering in Brussels was bleak, with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker telling reporters that it was a “sad day.”
“To see a country like Great Britain… leave the EU is not a moment of joy nor of celebration, it’s a sad moment and it’s a tragedy,” he said.
Speaking of the “shared sadness” felt by members, he added this was not a moment of “raising champagne glasses.”
France’s President Emmanuel Macron talks with EU chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, Austria’s Chancellor Sebastian Kurtz and European Council President Donald Tusk before the summit.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel struck a similarly sombre tone, telling reporters it was “tragic” that Britain was exiting the EU but “good” the two sides had reached an agreement.
“I feel sad.. but also a sense of relief that we were able to achieve what we have,” she said.
Meanwhile French President Emmanuel Macron said Brexit had proved that “our European Union has a certain fragility” and that “it can always be improved.”
My letter to the nation. #BackTheBrexitDeal pic.twitter.com/VGzNeeXoqg
— Theresa May (@theresa_may) November 24, 2018
Prime Minister May, perhaps unsurprisingly, was more optimistic in a letter to the British public on Saturday evening.
“It is a deal for a brighter future,” she wrote. Britain is set to exit the EU on March 29 next year, and May said it will be a “moment of renewal and reconciliation for our whole country.”
Spain had threatened to derail the Brussels summit after last-minute disagreements over Gibraltar — a British territory on the Iberian Peninsula — but these were resolved in negotiations Saturday.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/25/europe/brexit-brussels-summit-gbr-intl/index.html
