BFF-63 UK minister suggests Brexit talks will go to November

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UK minister suggests Brexit talks will go to November

LONDON, Oct 9, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – The British minister in charge of Brexit
negotiations on Tuesday played down hopes of a breakthrough at an EU summit
next week, suggesting it will take until November to get a deal.

Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab also declined to say when the government
plans to publish proposals on the Irish border, a key sticking point in the
talks.

The Brussels meeting of EU leaders on October 18 “will be an important
milestone, we expect that to be a moment where we will make some progress”,
he told MPs.

He added: “We’ve always been clear we would aim for the October council but
there would be leeway, that it might slip into November. We’re still clear on
that.”

Raab repeated a demand by Prime Minister Theresa May last month for the EU
to give ground in the talks.

“It is quite right now to expect the EU to move in our direction and if
they do match that ambition, if they do match that pragmatism (shown by
London), I am confident that we can still reach a deal,” he said.

The Brexit deal consists of a withdrawal agreement, which is being held up
by a dispute over how to keep open Britain’s land border with Ireland, and a
political declaration on future trading ties.

Britain has put forward a trade plan that it says will resolve the Irish
issue.

But at an informal summit in Salzburg, Austria, last month, European
leaders rejected the proposal and demanded it be reworked by next week’s
meeting.

They have held out the possibility of a special November summit to seal the
deal, but only if there is progress before then.

May’s Europe advisor Olly Robbins is in Brussels this week as the two sides
step up private negotiations in what some have called a “diplomatic tunnel”
leading up to next week’s summit.

BSS/AFP/MRI/2324 HRS