London justifies before Brussels and Dublin its imminent unilateral change of the Northern Ireland Protocol

The European Commission anticipates more "uncertainty" before the step that the United Kingdom will take this Monday

MADRID, 13 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Government of the United Kingdom has launched this Monday a round of contacts with the Irish Executive and the European Commission to anticipate the legislation that it will announce this Monday to unilaterally modify the Northern Ireland Protocol contemplated in Brexit, something that, according to Brussels, it will harm "confidence" and add more "uncertainty".

The British Foreign Minister, Liz Truss, has entered into talks with the vice president of the European Commission in charge of supervising relations with the United Kingdom, Maros Sefcovic, and with the head of Irish diplomacy, Simon Coveney.

Truss has insisted on her social networks that the United Kingdom "prefers a negotiated solution" and is "open to negotiations" with Brussels, but has warned that the European part "must be willing to change the Protocol itself."

London maintains that its law, which it plans to announce this Monday, is called to "restore political stability." "We cannot wait to fix the problems facing the people of Northern Ireland," said the minister, citing among the justifications the maintenance of the 1998 Good Friday Agreements.

Sefcovic, who already anticipated that the EU would not sit idly by and would respond with "all measures" to the non-consensual modification of the Northern Ireland Protocol, pointed out on Monday that the bloc "has always paid maximum attention to the impact of Brexit in Northern Ireland, offering workable solutions".

For his part, Coveney has pointed out that the door to dialogue remains open but has warned that the British announcement "adds more stability". "The UK Government proposes to distance itself from international law, reject a collaborative approach, ignore the majority in Northern Ireland and increase tension as the EU seeks a deal," she added.

The European Commission already opened a file in March 2021 for the first breaches of the Protocol, accepted at the time by the Government of Boris Johnson to avoid a 'hard border' in Ulster, which remained within the European common market.

However, Brussels decided in June to park this infringement procedure to give the negotiations one last chance, which have continued their course without the parties having managed to reach any kind of agreement.

Added to the controversy has also been the political instability of Northern Ireland, which has not started parliamentary activity after the last elections due to the refusal of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) to start work if there was not a modification of the Protocol first.