Brussels, 19/02/2016 (Agence Europe) - The European leaders had still not reached an agreement at the end of the afternoon on the second day of the European summit, Friday 19 February, regarding the conditions of a renewed relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union (see EUROPE 11492 and 11493).
After a series of bilateral meetings between British Prime Minister David Cameron and some of his counterparts - such as Angela Merkel from Germany, Matteo Renzi from Italy, Beata Szydlo from Poland and Bohuslav Sobotka from the Czech Republic - the leaders were to due to meet again for dinner at 8.00pm on Friday - the first session on Friday with all 28 member states intended to find this agreement.
“The general feeling is that we're not all that far off”, a diplomatic source commented at the end of the day. While some progress was made over the course of the day, the discussions were due to continue on the issues of eurozone governance and the principle of ever closer union, as well as on the access of Europeans to British work-related social benefit payments.
As regards economic governance, there were still “things to be clarified” so as to ensure there would be no distortion of competition between the continental and British financial markets that would arise from different regulatory requirements. Furthermore, work still remained to be done on wording the principle of ever closer union - a point particularly dear to Belgium's Prime Minister Charles Michel, who also insists that any agreement should fall if the British referendum leans towards the UK's exit from the EU.
With regard to the section on access to social benefit payments, discussions were continuing on the length of the safeguard clause. In Cameron's view, this clause should authorise the EU to limit these payments for seven years, which could be extended to 13 years. However, this length of time is considered too long by the so-called Visegrad countries (Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia). The debate on the export of family allowance to the country of origin “has not found a successful conclusion either”, this source stated.
Events could pick up pace if the EU28 note an agreement at dinner. If not, the form of the summit could then become “more difficult”, according to this source.
Schengen. Discussions also continued on Friday on the migration section of the agreement and especially on issues linked to the Schengen zone of freedom of movement. Greece is reported to have surprised people by making a link between the British issue and the migration crisis, threatening to block any agreement on the UK if the member states did not refrain from unilateral decisions aimed at stemming the flow of migrants by the summit in March and if Athens was de facto excluded from the Schengen zone. This news was not confirmed by EUROPE's two sources - with the British diplomatic source stating that this threat had not been brandished in Brussels. (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)