(The Guardian) Downing Street has warned that the Brexit negotiations have hit a “very difficult point”, as France threatened to wield its veto to kill a trade and security deal brought back from London by the EU’s chief negotiator.
With the negotiations hitting troubled waters at the 11th hour, Clément Beaune, France’s European affairs minister and a close ally of President Emmanuel Macron, said his country could act unilaterally if the terms were not right.
“I think it’s also the case for our partners that if there were a deal that isn’t good, which in our evaluation doesn’t correspond to those interests, we will oppose it,” Beaune said. “Yes, each country has a veto, so it’s possible. France like all its partners has the means of a veto. We must make our own evaluation of course of this deal, that’s normal. We owe that to the French people, we owe it to our fishermen, and to other economic sectors.
