Brussels (AFP)

EU leaders hope to take advantage of a videoconference on Monday with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to breathe new life into post-Brexit negotiations, which are still deadlocked but whose timetable will accelerate.

"The goal is to give a little more political visibility to the negotiations, because the coronavirus has invaded all of space," said a European source ahead of this meeting, scheduled for 12:30 GMT.

It is the first time since leaving the UK on January 31 that Boris Johnson has been personally involved in the discussions.

The EU will be represented by the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, and the Presidents of the Council Charles Michel and of the Parliament David Sassoli. European negotiator Michel Barnier will also participate.

This meeting had been planned for a long time: even before the start of the talks, the negotiators had met in June to "take stock". And decide whether to extend the transition period - which runs until December 31 - during which the British continue to apply European rules, which would leave more time to negotiate.

The inventory, after four rounds of discussions since March, is simple to summarize: the British and Europeans have camped in irreconcilable positions, preventing any progress. "We are nowhere," sums up a senior European official.

As for the transition period, the UK closed the subject on Friday by "formally" telling the EU of its refusal to extend it, as it has been saying over and over for months.

Therefore, barring the unexpected from the unpredictable Boris Johnson, this "high-level conference" - its official name - should above all serve to identify the difficulties. And to reiterate the common will to pass the second, in order to avoid a catastrophic "no deal" for economies already hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic.

- "Nationalists, populists" -

"It is a mandatory meeting, a milestone," which "will act as a political impetus to allow negotiations to break out. Or not," said a source close to the discussions.

London and Brussels have already agreed, before the meeting, to speed up the talks. The calendar is full for July, with meetings every week, sometimes in Brussels, sometimes in London, most in small committees, to move forward on the most conflicting files.

Among them, guarantees of fair competition in fiscal, social or environmental matters (the "level playing field", editor's note), required by the EU, which fears that an unregulated economy will emerge at its doorstep. But also the settlement of disputes between the two parties or the explosive issue of fishing.

So many issues to be resolved before October 31, the deadline set by Michel Barnier to allow time for member states and the United Kingdom to ratify a possible agreement which would enter into force on January 1, 2021.

In the absence of compromise, the only rules of the World Trade Organization (WTO), with their high customs duties and customs controls, would apply to trade relations between the former partners.

A prospect that panics the European employers' organization Business Europe, "extremely concerned" about the state of negotiations.

But for the Belgian MEP Philippe Lamberts, member of the coordination group of the European Parliament on Brexit, "the Europeans make an error of analysis" when they think that a compromise will impose itself in the face of economic risk.

The pro-Brexit "are nationalists, populists," said the boss of the environmental group on RTBF this weekend. "These are people for whom the economic criterion is not the determining criterion."

An unexpected announcement, intended not to penalize companies in the country already victims of the economic impact of the coronavirus.

"London is able to turn around", comments the close source, who detects "the confession that they are not ready".

© 2020 AFP