Britain and the EU have made an agreement on fishing rights in UK waters, allowing a £130billion defence and security deal to go ahead, Brussels’ foreign affairs chief said last night.
Kaja Kallas said ‘we are over the fish’ ahead of a major summit in London next week where Sir Keir Starmer hopes to confirm UK firms will join a 150 billion euro joint defence fund.
Sir Keir Starmer will host EU chiefs at a major summit on May 19 as he pushes for progress in his effort to ‘reset ‘ relations with Brussels after the turmoil of the years since the Brexit vote in 2016.
Ms Kallas, the former prime minister of Estonia has made little secret of her bewilderment at the Macron government using the rights of French trawlers to operate off Britain as leverage at a time when Europe faces a major threat from Russia and weakening US resolve under Trump.
But speaking to the BBC‘s Newsnight she said both sides were ‘working intensively’ towards a deal, adding: ‘In this security environment, in this global security environment that we are in I think the co-operation between the UK and the European Union is extremely important for both sides.’
Pressed further on the fishing deal she rolled her eyes and crossed her fingers, saying: ‘I think we are over the fish … any deal is not together unless everything is agreed, we still have a few elements there but I hope that we will get there.’
However, there may be a last-gasp new problem caused by Spain.
Madrid’s foreign minister Jose Manuel Albares suggested to the same programme that progress on the security deal could depend on resolving the issue of Gibraltar’s border.
Kaja Kallas said ‘we are over the fish’ ahead of a major summit in London next week where Sir Keir Starmer hopes to confirm UK firms will join a 150 billion euro joint defence fund.
Ms Kallas, the former prime minister of Estonia has made little secret of her bewilderment at the Macron government using the rights of French trawlers to operate off Britain as leverage at a time when Europe faces a major threat from Russia.
On Friday, Sir Keir told the Guardian that he is ‘ambitious’ about what could be achieved with the EU.
Talks on new rules governing the border between Spain and Gibraltar have been ongoing since Britain left the EU in 2020, but so far no agreement has been reached.
The Government, in line with its Conservative predecessors, has said that it will not sign up to a deal that gives sovereignty over Gibraltar to another country, or that the Gibraltarian government is not content with.
Gibraltar was ceded to the UK by Spain in 1713 and the population is heavily in favour of remaining a British overseas territory.
The last time it voted on a proposal to share sovereignty with Spain, in 2002, almost 99 per cent of Gibraltarians rejected the move.
Speaking to BBC Newsnight on Monday, Mr Albares suggested progress on the security deal could depend on resolving the issue of Gibraltar’s border.
He said: ‘I think the relationship between UK and European Union, it’s a comprehensive relation, a global relation, not just a pick-and-choose relation. Because there are many, many things that we have to talk (about), Gibraltar included.
‘So I would like to see a global deal on everything to make sure that the relationship is as smooth as possible.’
The Government has said Gibraltar will ‘always remain part of the British family’, but it had ‘inherited a situation’ that ‘left Gibraltar’s economy and way of life under threat’.
Foreign minister José Manuel Albares used a BBC interview to suggest that the UK’s future relationship with the EU would be linked to the future of the historic enclave.
Since December 2020, a post-Brexit deal between the UK, Spain and the EU has allowed citizens of Gibraltar to remain part of the border-free Schengen area among other EU agreements. But no permanent solution has yet been found.
The meeting in London is likely to be the first in a series of annual summits between the UK and the EU.
On Friday, Sir Keir told the Guardian that he is ‘ambitious’ about what could be achieved with the EU.
‘I want a closer relationship on security, on defence, on trade and on the economy,’ he told the newspaper.
Last month Ms Kallas, whose country was occupied by Soviet Russia until 1991, mocked France for bringing up fishing rights, suggesting that the threat from Putin was on a different level entirely.
Speaking on Radio 4’s Today programme in April she said: ‘I’m definitely pushing this from my side because I think the UK is a very important defence and security partner, it’s the most logical defence and security partner that we have and it is a beneficial relationship for both sides.’
And laughing, she added: ‘I’m learning in this job … fish to the French they are very important.’