Dublin warns that Britain won’t be trusted as a world player if they follow Boris Johnson’s calls to axe the Brexit backstop plan
Frank Feighan, from ruling Fine Gael, has said that this Government are 'very concerned about the mood in the last few days'.
BRITAIN will never be trusted as a world player again if it caves into Boris Johnson’s demands to rip up the Brexit backstop agreement, Dublin has warned.
Irish senator Frank Feighan from ruling Fine Gael took aim at Northern Ireland Secretary Karen Bradley warning his government are “very concerned about the mood in the last few days.”
He pointed to suggestions that the UK was trying to wriggle out of commitments made in Brussels last December to avoid a hard border through the backstop insurance option.
Both sides agreed to have a “backstop” position that would avoid a hard border even if a wider trade deal failed to be struck.
But negotiators are at loggerheads on how this pledge will be translated into a legally binding commitment.
Mr Feighan blasted: “How can you renege on a written deal and could the UK ever be trusted again if it were to renege on a written deal?”
Last week Boris Johnson said agreeing to the backstop plan to keep closely aligned to Brussels would be the UK’s “greatest humiliation” since the Suez Crisis.
Ms Bradley insisted the Government were good to their word, saying: “we are committed to everything that we have agreed to in the joint report and we will ensure that there is no border on the island of Ireland.
But she risked controversy after telling the Anglo-Irish summit that relations are “stronger than at any point since Irish independence nearly a century ago” - despite Brexit driving London and Dublin into bitter 18 months of bitter public spats.
Her claim came the same day that Irish boss Leo Varadkar took to Twitter to mock the UK.
Noting his country had repaid all its loans to the IMF, he told his 176,000 followers he was “Happy to do same for UK and help them out financially in the future if they need it for some reason.”
Britain lent Ireland close to 4 billion Euros during the crash as part of a rescue package, with the cash due to be repaid by 2021.
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