LONDON: Britain will not blink first in Brexit trade negotiations with the European Union and is not scared of a no-deal exit, the country’s top Brexit negotiator warned the bloc on Sunday.
Britain left the EU on Jan. 31 but talks have so far made little headway on agreeing a new trade deal with the bloc by the time a status-quo transition arrangement ends in December.
“We came in after a government and negotiating team that had blinked and had its bluff called at critical moments and the EU had learned not to take our word seriously,” negotiator David Frost told the Mail on Sunday.
“So a lot of what we are trying to do this year is to get them to realize that we mean what we say and they should take our position seriously,” he was quoted as saying.
Talks are due to resume in London on Tuesday but they have stalled over Britain’s insistence that it have full autonomy over state aid and its demands over fishing.
Britain says the EU is dragging its feet in talks and has failed to fully accept that it is now an independent country.
“We are not going to be a client state. We are not going to compromise on the fundamentals of having control over our own laws,” Frost told the Mail. “We are not going to accept level playing field provisions that lock us in to the way the EU do things.”
“That’s what being an independent country is about, that’s what the British people voted for and that’s what will happen at the end of the year, come what may,” Frost said.
He said a lot of preparation had been done for a possible exit without a trade deal.
“I don’t think that we are scared of this at all,” Frost said. “If we can reach an agreement that regulates trade like Canada’s, great. If we can’t, it will be an Australian-like trading agreement and we are fully ready for that.”
UK warns EU on Brexit: We won’t blink first
https://arab.news/bmv9f
UK warns EU on Brexit: We won’t blink first
- Britain left the EU on Jan. 31 but talks have so far made little headway on agreeing a new trade deal with the bloc
Saudi Arabia raises $605m in January sukuk issuance: NDMC
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s National Debt Management Center has raised SR2.26 billion ($605 million) through its latest sukuk issuance.
Sukuk are Shariah-compliant financial instruments akin to bonds, granting investors a share in the issuer’s assets. Unlike conventional bonds, they comply with Islamic finance principles, which forbid interest-based transactions.
According to the NDMC, the January issuance was divided into five tranches. The first tranche was valued at SR410 million and is set to mature in 2031. The second amounted to SR338 million, maturing in 2033, while the third tranche, worth SR101 million, will expire in 2036.
The fourth portion, valued at SR523,000, is due in 2039, while the last tranche, due in 2041, was valued at SR1.42 billion.
The January figure represents a decrease of 67.64 percent compared to December, when the Kingdom raised SR7.01 billion from sukuk issuances.
In recent years, the Kingdom’s debt market has experienced swift growth, with investors increasingly turning to fixed-income instruments as rising global interest rates reshape the financial landscape.
This comes as the Gulf Cooperation Council sukuk outstanding climbed 12.7 percent to $1.1 trillion by the end of the third quarter of 2025, according to a recent Fitch Ratings report.
The US-based credit rating agency said debt capital market activity in the GCC is expected to remain strong into 2026, supported by a healthy pipeline of anticipated issuances.
The report noted that sukuk issuances increased 22 percent year on year in the first nine months of this year, accounting for 40 percent of total GCC DCM outstanding.
Sukuk also outpaced bond growth, which expanded 7.2 percent year on year.
Also known as Islamic bonds, these debt products allow investors to gain partial ownership of an issuer’s assets until maturity.
