DAVOS: Former prime minister Tony Blair said on Thursday that Britain should hold a second referendum to bring “closure” to the chaotic Brexit process, and he believed the chances of such a vote taking place were now greater than 50 percent.
With just over nine weeks till Britain is due to leave the EU, there is still no deal on the divorce terms and future relations after parliament last week crushingly defeated the plan that Prime Minister Theresa May had negotiated.
“I think if you have another referendum it really will bring closure. People like myself accept if the country votes to leave again, that’s it,” Blair, who opposes leaving the European Union, told Reuters TV at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
“But I think if you leave without going back to the people, with this mess and in these circumstances, there will be even greater division.”
Since rejecting May’s deal, British lawmakers have failed to unite behind any other option and remain deeply divided over how to proceed. Some favor a second referendum as a way of breaking the deadlock in parliament.
Blair, who is from the main opposition Labour Party and served as prime minister from 1997 to 2007, said Britain could not leave the EU unless it knew where it was heading. If that meant applying to push back the March 29 Brexit date, then Britain should apply for that, he added.
“The idea that we can tumble out of the European Union without a deal, I mean this would be completely irresponsible and I’m sure that parliament won’t allow it,” he said.
Britons voted in a 2016 referendum by 52 percent to 48 percent to leave the EU.
Blair urges second Brexit vote to bring “closure“
Blair urges second Brexit vote to bring “closure“
- “I think if you have another referendum it really will bring closure," Blair said
- Since rejecting May’s deal, British lawmakers have failed to unite behind any other option and remain deeply divided over how to proceed
UN chief Guterres warns ‘powerful forces’ undermining global ties
- Guterres paid tribute to Britain for its decisive role in the creation of the United Nations
- He said 2025 had been a “profoundly challenging year for international cooperation and the values of the UN“
LONDON: UN chief Antonio Guterres Saturday deplored a host of “powerful forces lining up to undermine global cooperation” in a London speech marking the 80th anniversary of the first UN General Assembly.
Guterres, whose term as secretary-general ends on December 31 this year, delivered the warning at the Methodist Central Hall in London, where representatives from 51 countries met on January 10, 1946, for the General Assembly’s first session.
They met in London because the UN headquarters in New York had not yet been built.
Guterres paid tribute to Britain for its decisive role in the creation of the United Nations and for continuing to champion it.
But he said 2025 had been a “profoundly challenging year for international cooperation and the values of the UN.”
“We see powerful forces lining up to undermine global cooperation,” he said, adding: “Despite these rough seas, we sail ahead.”
Guterres cited a new treaty on marine biological diversity as an example of continued progress.
The treaty establishes the first legal framework for the conservation and sustainable use of marine diversity in the two-thirds of oceans beyond national limits.
“These quiet victories of international cooperation — the wars prevented, the famine averted, the vital treaties secured — do not always make the headlines,” he said.
“Yet they are real. And they matter.”
