Boris Johnson, the former mayor of London and a leading leave campaigner, said there should be “no haste” in the preparations for the exit of Britain, the first sovereign country to vote to leave the union.
Advertisement
The German leader said she was seeking an “objective, good” climate in talks on Britain’s exit.
“[There’s] no need to be particularly nasty in any way in the negotiations”, she said.
The meeting between the diplomats of Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg marks the first multilateral talks to be convened after the outcome of the United Kingdom referendum, in which some 52 per cent of Britons voted for exit, Efe news reported.
Merkel did however say that Britain’s exit talks should not “drag on forever” and that until they were completed, Britain would remain a fully-fledged European Union member “with all the rights and responsibilities”.
But European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker told German television on Friday night that it made “no sense” to hang around until October and that he expected Britain’s farewell letter on his desk “immediately”.
In Berlin, Merkel, expressed “great regret” at Britain’s decision, but said the European Union should not draw “quick and simple conclusions” that might create new and deeper divisions. “But the British people took a different decision, and that is the way that democracy works”, the Conservative party peer and a close aide of David Cameron said in a statement.
Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier admitted that “we don’t have an answer to all the questions that have arisen from” the vote. We must now be allowed to focus on the future of Europe.
The EU’s founding states said Saturday they want Britain to begin leaving the union “as soon as possible” as France urged a new British prime minister to take office quickly.
The comments came as a prominent Leave advocate, Tory MEP Daniel Hannan, came under fire for saying a post-Brexit Britain could still join the single market with its free movement of labour rules.
The officials said they were anxious that British Prime Minister David Cameron, who resigned on Friday, could hand over to someone with a strategy to drag out the country’s departure.
“We start now”, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault told reporters in Berlin.
Only Britain can invoke Article 50 of the European Union treaty required to set in motion the process to exit the bloc.
Together with SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel, deputy chancellor in Berlin, Mr Schulz has put forward a 10-point EU reform plan proposing more powers for the EU and national parliaments, and criticising the closed-door meetings in Brussels attended by Dr Merkel and other EU leaders.
“There are many concerns that our citizens have…in terms of migration, in terms of jobs and growth, but also in security”, he added. He was heading into meetings Saturday with his counterparts from France, Netherlands, Italy, Belgium and Luxembourg.
Advertisement
“It’s totally clear that in times like these one should neither be hysterical, nor fall into paralysis”, he said as the talks began.
