AIRLINK 72.13 Increased By ▲ 2.93 (4.23%)
BOP 5.04 Increased By ▲ 0.14 (2.86%)
CNERGY 4.32 Increased By ▲ 0.06 (1.41%)
DFML 31.40 Increased By ▲ 0.15 (0.48%)
DGKC 80.37 Increased By ▲ 3.12 (4.04%)
FCCL 21.03 Increased By ▲ 1.03 (5.15%)
FFBL 34.82 Decreased By ▼ -0.18 (-0.51%)
FFL 9.17 Increased By ▲ 0.05 (0.55%)
GGL 9.81 Increased By ▲ 0.01 (0.1%)
HBL 113.40 Increased By ▲ 0.64 (0.57%)
HUBC 134.20 Increased By ▲ 1.16 (0.87%)
HUMNL 7.02 Increased By ▲ 0.07 (1.01%)
KEL 4.35 Increased By ▲ 0.12 (2.84%)
KOSM 4.35 Increased By ▲ 0.10 (2.35%)
MLCF 37.20 Increased By ▲ 0.60 (1.64%)
OGDC 135.40 Increased By ▲ 2.53 (1.9%)
PAEL 23.69 Increased By ▲ 1.05 (4.64%)
PIAA 24.60 Increased By ▲ 0.40 (1.65%)
PIBTL 6.52 Increased By ▲ 0.06 (0.93%)
PPL 120.40 Increased By ▲ 4.10 (3.53%)
PRL 26.33 Increased By ▲ 0.43 (1.66%)
PTC 13.20 Increased By ▲ 0.12 (0.92%)
SEARL 52.40 Increased By ▲ 0.40 (0.77%)
SNGP 71.40 Increased By ▲ 3.80 (5.62%)
SSGC 10.60 Increased By ▲ 0.06 (0.57%)
TELE 8.40 Increased By ▲ 0.12 (1.45%)
TPLP 11.11 Increased By ▲ 0.31 (2.87%)
TRG 60.51 Increased By ▲ 1.22 (2.06%)
UNITY 25.21 Increased By ▲ 0.08 (0.32%)
WTL 1.27 No Change ▼ 0.00 (0%)
BR100 7,490 Increased By 81.2 (1.1%)
BR30 24,512 Increased By 475.5 (1.98%)
KSE100 71,504 Increased By 837.6 (1.19%)
KSE30 23,444 Increased By 220 (0.95%)

BELFAST: The European Union will not renegotiate post-Brexit trade arrangements in Northern Ireland but wants to ease supply issues there, commission Vice-President Maros Sefcovic said on Friday on a tour of the UK province.

Sefcovic said the so-called Northern Ireland protocol was “the only solution” allowing trade between the UK and EU following Britain’s withdrawal from the bloc’s single market and customs union at the start of the year.

It mandates checks on goods crossing the Irish Sea from mainland Britain — England, Scotland and Wales — and was agreed by London last year as part of its drawn-out divorce from the EU.

“A renegotiation of the protocol — as the UK government is suggesting — would mean instability, uncertainty and unpredictability in Northern Ireland,” Sefcovic argued in a speech at Queen’s University Belfast.

“Instead, let’s see what can be done to further ease the supply of goods,” he added, in a nod to business and trading issues that have emerged since the arrangements came into force on January 1.

“The protocol is not the problem. On the contrary, it is the only solution we have. Failing to apply it will not make problems disappear, but simply take away the tools to solve them.”

Sefcovic’s comments come the day after the leader of Northern Ireland’s biggest party suspended cooperation with Dublin and warned he might collapse its devolved government in protest at the post-Brexit rules.

Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Jeffrey Donaldson demanded “significant and substantial changes” to the protocol, warning the province’s political institutions “will not survive a failure to resolve the problems” it has caused.

Comments

Comments are closed.