Previewing Today’s Main Event: David Cameron Arrives In Brussels
By Tyler Durden
For the first time since triggering a political earthquake that’s shaken Europe’s foundations with his now massively backfired decision to hold a EU membership referendum in 2015, a decision which won him the parliamentary election battle but lost him, and Europe, the war, UK Prime Minister David Cameron is set to face his fellow – and very angry – European Union leaders at what may be Cameron’s last summit (or supper as Bloomberg puts it) in Brussels, even as back in London, the race to succeed him is heating up.
Cameron arriving at the EU summit in the next half hour or so…..
— Laura Kuenssberg (@bbclaurak) June 28, 2016
As BBC puts it, David Cameron wanted to arrive in Brussels triumphant… instead he is coming as a disgraced failure.
“Cameron wanted to come back here today as the man who’d kept the UK in the EU, who’d settled the question that has plagued the UK for decades. And instead, he has to look round the table and say, “I’ve just taken the UK out, with all the consequences that brings”. But of course, these are European leaders, it’s not going to descend into any kind of bickering. I think they’ll all be trying to say, “How do we move forward from here?””
As Bloomberg eloquently adds, Cameron will endure an awkward dinner with his EU cohorts Tuesday after his effort to calm the U.K.’s divided public and soothe investors failed to stop the pound and the country’s biggest banks from getting clobbered. The premier has already announced he will quit after last week’s vote, leaving him little leverage at the table.
His government has signaled it prefers a gradual exit from the EU while the region’s three largest economies are keen to set a timetable to contain the economic damage. Which is contrary to his earlier claims (made when he was confident of Remain winning) that the Article 50 process would be triggered immediately after a Leave vote.
“We don’t know how long he is going to be prime minister for, when a new government could begin to negotiate terms,” said Mark Leonard, director of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “The rest of the EU feel they bent over backwards to accommodate Cameron over the last months and he launched this reckless referendum and lost it so the other EU states are in no mood to do him any favors.”
In Brussels, Cameron will be pressed to give some indication on how he expects the U.K. to trigger Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty – the mechanism for leaving the EU – and what he thinks Britain’s relationship with the bloc will look like after the divorce, according to diplomats in Brussels.
But the outgoing prime minister has said those details would be up to his successor to hash out, a strategy which Merkel has endorsed in hopes that as the fallout over the Brexit decision settles the UK may collectively change its mind about its depature.
“He’s …read more
Source: Previewing Today’s Main Event: David Cameron Arrives In Brussels
