LONDON: British Prime Minister Theresa May on Monday will try to crack the deadlock over Brexit by setting out proposals in parliament that are expected to focus on winning more concessions from the European Union.
With just over two months left until the United Kingdom is due to leave the European Union on March 29 there is no agreement in London on how and even whether it should leave the world’s biggest trading bloc.
After her Brexit divorce deal was rejected by 402 lawmakers in the 650-seat parliament last week, May has been searching for a way to get a deal through parliament.
Attempts to forge a consensus with the opposition Labour Party failed so May is expected to focus on winning over 118 rebels in her own party and the small Northern Irish party which props up her government with concessions from the EU.
In a sign of just how grave the political crisis in London has become, the Daily Telegraph reported that May was even considering amending the 1998 Good Friday Agreement which ended 30 years of violence in Northern Ireland.
The Daily Telegraph said EU sources cast May’s plan a non-starter as a renegotiation of such a significant international treaty would require the consent of all the parties involved in Northern Ireland.
May told British ministers she would focus on securing changes from Brussels designed to win over rebel Conservatives and the Northern Irish Democratic Unionist Party, The Times said.
May will make a statement in parliament around Monday afternoon and put forward a motion in parliament on her proposed next steps on Brexit, though some lawmakers are planning to wrest control of Britain’s exit from the government.
After May’s motion is published, lawmakers will be able to propose amendments to it, setting out alternatives to the prime minister’s deal.
Parliament is deeply divided over Brexit, with different factions of lawmakers supporting a wide range of options including leaving without a deal, holding a second referendum and seeking a customs union with the EU.
Ever since Britain voted by 52-48 percent to leave the EU in a referendum in June 2016, London’s political class has been debating how to leave the European project forged by France and Germany after the devastation of World War Two.
While the country is divided over EU membership, most agree that the world’s fifth largest economy is at a crossroads and that its choices over Brexit will shape the prosperity of future generations for years to come.
Supporters of EU membership cast Brexit as a immense mistake that will undermine the West, smash Britain’s reputation as a stable destination for investment and slowly weaken London’s position as one of the world’s top two financial capitals.
Brexit supporters cast leaving as a way to break free from a union they see as a doomed German-dominated experiment in unity that is fast falling behind the leading economic powers of the 21st century, the United States and China.
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British PM May tries to break Brexit deadlock by winning more EU concessions
British PM May tries to break Brexit deadlock by winning more EU concessions
- Only two months left till UK is supposed to leave the EU, but no final agreement on how exists yet
- May will make a statement in the parliament Monday afternoon to present her plans on Brexit
’Weak by design’ African Union gathers for summit
ADDIS ABABA: The African Union (AU) holds its annual summit in Ethiopia this weekend at a time of genocide, myriad insurgencies and coups stretching from one end of the continent to the other, for which it has few answers.
The AU, formed in 2002, has 55 member states who are often on opposing sides of conflicts. They have routinely blocked attempts to hand real enforcement power to the AU that could constrain their action, leaving it under-funded and under-equipped.
It has missed successive deadlines to make itself self-funding — in 2020 and 2025. Today, it still relies for 64 percent of its annual budget on the United States and European Union, who are cutting back support.
Its chairman, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, is reduced to expressing “deep concern” over the continent’s endless crises — from wars in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo to insurgencies across the Sahel — but with limited scope to act.
“At a time when the AU is needed the most, it is arguably at its weakest since it was inaugurated,” said the International Crisis Group (ICG) in a recent report.
- Ignoring own rules -
With 10 military coups in Africa since 2020, the AU has been forced to ignore the rule in its charter that coup-leaders must not stand for elections. Gabon and Guinea, suspended after their coups, were reinstated this past year despite breaking that rule.
Meanwhile, there has been no “deep concern” over a string of elections marred by rigging and extreme violence.
Youssouf was quick to congratulate Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan after she won 98 percent in a vote in October in which all leading opponents were barred or jailed and thousands of protesters were killed by security forces.
The AU praised the “openness” of an election in Burundi in June described by Human Rights Watch as “dominated by repression (and) censorship.”
The problem, said Benjamin Auge, of the French Institute of International Relations, is that few African leaders care about how they are viewed abroad as they did in the early days after independence.
“There are no longer many presidents with pan-African ambitions,” he told AFP.
“Most of the continent’s leaders are only interested in their internal problems. They certainly don’t want the AU to interfere in domestic matters,” he added.
- AU ‘supports dialogue’ -
AU representatives point out that its work stretches far beyond conflict, with bodies doing valuable work on health, development, trade and much more.
Spokesman Nuur Mohamud Sheekh told AFP that its peace efforts went unnoticed because they were measured in conflicts that were prevented.
“The AU has helped de-escalate political tensions and support dialogue before situations descend into violence,” he said, citing the work done to prevent war between Sudan and South Sudan over the flashpoint region of Abyei.
But African states show little interest in building up an organization that might constrain them.
Power remains instead with the AU Assembly, made up of individual heads of state, including the three longest-ruling non-royals in the world: Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea (46 years), Paul Biya of Cameroon (44) and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda (40).
“The African Union is weak because its members want it that way,” wrote two academics for The Conversation last year.
This weekend, the rotating presidency of the AU assembly passes to Burundi’s President Evariste Ndayishimiye, fresh from his party’s 97-percent election victory.
Coups, conflicts and rights abuses may get discussed, but the main theme is water sanitation.
The AU, formed in 2002, has 55 member states who are often on opposing sides of conflicts. They have routinely blocked attempts to hand real enforcement power to the AU that could constrain their action, leaving it under-funded and under-equipped.
It has missed successive deadlines to make itself self-funding — in 2020 and 2025. Today, it still relies for 64 percent of its annual budget on the United States and European Union, who are cutting back support.
Its chairman, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, is reduced to expressing “deep concern” over the continent’s endless crises — from wars in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo to insurgencies across the Sahel — but with limited scope to act.
“At a time when the AU is needed the most, it is arguably at its weakest since it was inaugurated,” said the International Crisis Group (ICG) in a recent report.
- Ignoring own rules -
With 10 military coups in Africa since 2020, the AU has been forced to ignore the rule in its charter that coup-leaders must not stand for elections. Gabon and Guinea, suspended after their coups, were reinstated this past year despite breaking that rule.
Meanwhile, there has been no “deep concern” over a string of elections marred by rigging and extreme violence.
Youssouf was quick to congratulate Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan after she won 98 percent in a vote in October in which all leading opponents were barred or jailed and thousands of protesters were killed by security forces.
The AU praised the “openness” of an election in Burundi in June described by Human Rights Watch as “dominated by repression (and) censorship.”
The problem, said Benjamin Auge, of the French Institute of International Relations, is that few African leaders care about how they are viewed abroad as they did in the early days after independence.
“There are no longer many presidents with pan-African ambitions,” he told AFP.
“Most of the continent’s leaders are only interested in their internal problems. They certainly don’t want the AU to interfere in domestic matters,” he added.
- AU ‘supports dialogue’ -
AU representatives point out that its work stretches far beyond conflict, with bodies doing valuable work on health, development, trade and much more.
Spokesman Nuur Mohamud Sheekh told AFP that its peace efforts went unnoticed because they were measured in conflicts that were prevented.
“The AU has helped de-escalate political tensions and support dialogue before situations descend into violence,” he said, citing the work done to prevent war between Sudan and South Sudan over the flashpoint region of Abyei.
But African states show little interest in building up an organization that might constrain them.
Power remains instead with the AU Assembly, made up of individual heads of state, including the three longest-ruling non-royals in the world: Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea (46 years), Paul Biya of Cameroon (44) and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda (40).
“The African Union is weak because its members want it that way,” wrote two academics for The Conversation last year.
This weekend, the rotating presidency of the AU assembly passes to Burundi’s President Evariste Ndayishimiye, fresh from his party’s 97-percent election victory.
Coups, conflicts and rights abuses may get discussed, but the main theme is water sanitation.
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