The Ambassador of the European Union to the United States has told The Cipher Brief that “no-one is in a hurry for the UK to leave” the EU. Ambassador David O’Sullivan said Tuesday’s meeting of national leaders in Brussels would be looking to British Prime Minister David Cameron for an explanation as to what has just happened, its consequences and to give a likely timetable to make its definitive position known.
The EU Ambassador said that until such time as the United Kingdom makes a proposal to trigger Article 50 to begin exit negotiations, it remains a full member of the European Union. He added that while he didn’t know how the debate post-referendum in Britain would play out; the referendum result in itself does not have legal effect in European terms.
David Cameron is expected to brief the other 27 national leaders at a European Council summit in Brussels on Tuesday on the decision by UK voters to leave the European Union. On Friday, the British PM said he would resign and that it would be up to the country’s new leader to decide when to trigger Article 50. Ambassador O’Sullivan said calls by European leaders over the weekend for Britain to begin exit negotiations as soon as possible was based on the assumption that the referendum had given a clear result to leave. But now that the UK had said it needed a little more time to reflect on how and whether it would trigger Article 50, people, as he put it, would just have to wait.
When asked how long European leaders would give the United Kingdom to decide about Article 50, the Ambassador replied that the real question is what the UK intends to do and by what process it will move to closure - the assumption being it will make an Article 50 application. Intense debate within the UK following the referendum result, he stressed, remains an internal matter and it only enters the realm of European politics when the government makes a formal proposal about Article 50.
Asked about the prospect of other member countries moving to leave the EU, Mr. O’Sullivan said it was highly unlikely in his view that that would happen. Enlargement policy, he believed, would not be affected as a result of Brexit. Ongoing membership negotiations with some countries - including Turkey - would continue.
While there will be a wide range of implications for EU policies in general, when it comes to Defense specifically, the Ambassador pointed out that NATO membership was the main pillar of security for the vast majority of EU member states (22 in all). No one, he said, is going to want a UK departure to weaken the overall European security architecture.
When asked what he would be saying to the United States in the wake of the UK referendum result, Ambassador O’Sullivan said an EU with 27 member countries without the UK would remain one of the largest economic trading blocs in the world and would remain absolutely essential to the global security architecture while continuing to play a stabilizing role in Europe and beyond. The EU, he added, would remain a very important partner for the United States on a wide range of issues.
Fionnuala Sweeney is Vice President and Executive Editor of The Cipher Brief, and spoke with the Ambassador on Sunday, 26 June 2016.
