The Hague (AFP)
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday that an agreement on Brexit with the UK was possible until October 31, not only in "30 days".
"I said (to Boris Johnson British Prime Minister) that what you want to do in two or three years, you can do it in 30 days, or (...) by October 31," he said. said Merkel visiting The Hague.
Receiving Wednesday in Berlin Boris Johnson, the German Chancellor had said that it was possible to reach in the "30 days" to a negotiated agreement for an exit of Britain from the European Union (EU).
Speaking of 30 days was "symbolic" to show that the British can, if they wish, reach an agreement "in a short time", she said Thursday at a press conference with the Prime Minister Dutch Mark Rutte.
"Britain has said it wants to leave the European Union on October 31" and "by then we have to work (to an agreement), if the will to achieve it exists on both sides", a- she asserted.
After his visit to Berlin, Boris Johnson was in Paris on Thursday to meet French President Emmanuel Macron.
"I think we can have an agreement and a good deal" for a Brexit on October 31, said Johnson when he arrived at the presidential palace of the Elysee.
At his side, Emmanuel Macron was more cautious but said he was "confident" that a solution could be found "in the next 30 days" between London and the 27.
Discussions on a UK-brokered UK bloc exit are currently hitting the so-called "safety net" mechanism in the London-EU deal.
This controversial provision is a kind of insurance policy for the EU.
It aims to prevent the emergence, after Brexit, of a new border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in the south, at the risk of waking up the conflict on the island.
© 2019 AFP