British PM sends unsigned letter seeking Brexit delay

LONDON, United Kingdom — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson reluctantly wrote to Brussels late Saturday asking for a Brexit extension after MPs voted to force him into seeking a delay beyond October 31.

But Johnson, who has pinned his premiership on getting Britain out of the European Union on time, refused to sign the letter he sent to European Council President Donald Tusk.


The Conservative leader also sent a second signed letter insisting he was not seeking an extension to the Brexit deadline, which has already been postponed twice.

In a day of high drama in the House of Commons, MPs declined to give their backing to the revised withdrawal agreement Johnson struck with the EU this week until the legislation needed to ratify it has passed.

Having failed to back a divorce deal, they triggered a law requiring Johnson to write to EU leaders by the end of the day asking to delay Brexit, to avoid the risk that Britain crashes out in less than a fortnight.

Johnson sent a photocopy of the letter that was contained in the law requiring him to ask for the delay, but did not sign it, showed a copy released by his Downing Street office early Sunday.

He wrote and signed another letter which made clear he does not want to delay Brexit beyond the end of this month.

“Regrettably, parliament missed the opportunity to inject momentum into the ratification process,” Johnson wrote in the signed letter, regretting that EU leaders would now have to spend yet more time on Brexit.

“A further extension would damage the interests of the UK and our EU partners, and the relationship between us. We must bring this process to a conclusion.”

Johnson nonetheless said he remained “confident” of completing the ratification process by October 31.

A third cover letter written by Britain’s EU ambassador Tim Barrow made clear that the Brexit delay request letter was only being sent to comply with the law.


Tusk consults EU chiefs

“I will now start consulting EU leaders on how to react,” Tusk said on Twitter.

An EU source told AFP that the process “may take a few days” and declined to comment on the non-signature.

A Downing Street spokeswoman said the prime minister had spoken to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron and Tusk.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said he had discussed the situation with Johnson and “wished him success in the next stages” in the Commons.

Being forced to send the letter after Saturday’s defeat was a blow to Johnson, who has previously said he would rather be “dead in a ditch” than prolong the tortuous process of ending Britain’s 46-year-old membership of the EU.

Brussels urged Britain to explain its plan as soon as possible, while Macron’s office said a new delay to Brexit was “in nobody’s interest”.

Johnson beaten 322-306

Securing the new divorce treaty at Thursday’s EU summit had been a personal victory for the prime minister, a figurehead in the Leave campaign in Britain’s 2016 EU membership referendum.

He had spent 48 hours frantically trying to persuade MPs to back it, and won support from many of the eurosceptic Conservatives who had three times rejected a previous divorce agreement secured by his predecessor Theresa May.


But parliament — like the frustrated public — is still bitterly divided over how and even whether Britain should end decades of integration with its closest trading partner.

MPs voted by 322 to 306 to back a motion by former Conservative minister Oliver Letwin that “withholds approval (of the deal) unless and until implementing legislation is passed”.

They were meeting on a Saturday for the first time since the 1982 Falklands War.

While MPs voted inside parliament, outside, more than 100,000 people marched to demand a new referendum that could reverse Brexit.

Demonstrators erupted into cheers at the news from inside the Commons.

“That’s really good, that’s one step away from Brexit,” demonstrator Philip Dobson told AFP.

“Reject Brexit”, “Put It To The People” and “Stop This Madness” read some of the placards at the mass march, where many protesters also waved EU flags.

Legislation next week

The British government will introduce legislation next week to implement the divorce deal, with a first vote as soon as Tuesday.

The government also wants another vote on the deal on Monday, which may not be possible.


There is a chance the deal could pass, and Britain could still leave the EU on October 31, but there remains strong opposition to the agreement among MPs.

source: newsinfo.inquirer.net

UK’s reputation takes global hit with Parliament shutdown

LONDON — It’s long been known that Britain’s Parliament building must be vacated for urgent repairs that will take years and cost billions, but the problem now goes beyond the water leaks and vermin infestation to Britain’s global reputation as a model of democracy-in-action.

In parts of the world where Britain’s parliamentary system and adherence to the rule of law provided a model to emerging nations, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s brusque decision to shut down Parliament for crucial weeks ahead of the looming Brexit deadline is seen by some as proof that Britain, too, can be subject to a power grab.


Johnson’s gambit may pay off if he is able to make Brexit a reality on Oct. 31 without doing grave damage to Britain’s economy, but the widely held perception that he is shuttering Parliament to squelch debate (despite his claims to the contrary) has been roundly condemned in key parts of the former British Empire, including some where Queen Elizabeth II is still accorded the status of head of state.

Many Britons — politicians and the public alike — have a lofty view of the country’s role in world affairs, emphasizing its seat on the United Nations Security Council, its nuclear arsenal, and its traditional influence in trouble spots like the Middle East. But the prolonged impasse over Brexit, which was approved more than three years ago but still hasn’t taken place, has taken a toll on how much of the world views Britain’s vaunted political institutions.

Nicholas Sengoba, a columnist in the former British colony of Uganda, said Johnson’s action shows that Britain is not immune to the abuse of power that has plagued some African nations. “The whole notion that a British prime minister cannot be as powerful as an African dictator has been stripped off,” he said.

The prolonged Brexit stalemate in Britain has made the former colonial power “look extremely bad” because there is no clear leadership and no consensus on what the actual consequences of a “no deal” Brexit might be, he said.

Britain’s longstanding reputation for openness and fair play has been tarnished by a years-long rift in the opposition Labour Party over whether party chief Jeremy Corbyn and his top advisers tolerate anti-Semitism — there has even been a police investigation of some party members — and a desire to keep foreigners from settling in Britain under liberal European Union regulations was at least in part responsible for the 2016 Brexit vote in favor of leaving the 28-nation bloc.


Many academics warn that the loss of EU funding, and a stiffening of rules that made it easy for Europeans to study, research and teach in Britain, will lower the standards of Britain’s world-class scientific and medical institutions, and perhaps even dim the quality of the country’s brilliant arts scene. Even the respected royal family is not untouched, with new photographs and stories that document Prince Andrew’s association with pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein, who killed himself in prison in August.

Some have also been surprised by the queen’s role in the shutdown of Parliament. As head of state in a constitutional monarchy, Queen Elizabeth II is required to maintain strict neutrality on all political issues, which left her little choice but to approve Johnson’s request to shutter Parliament for a longer-than-usual time period.

No one outside her closest family members and inner circle of advisers is likely to ever know whether she felt Johnson’s request was appropriate or gave the executive branch too much power by limiting debate in the legislature, just as no one in the media or public can say with certainty how the queen feels on the underlying question of whether it is wise for Britain to leave the EU.

Britain’s tortured path toward Brexit — perhaps now nearing its climax — has exacted a price. In New Zealand, another former colony, the latest moves by Johnson have provoked some talk about whether it’s time to change its status as a constitutional monarchy with Elizabeth as a figurehead head of state (she does, after all, reside nearly 12,000 miles away) and instead transform into a republic.



In a satirical tweet, newspaper columnist Dave Armstrong wrote that it would be dangerous for New Zealand to become a republic “as it would sever our ties with the UK — a stable parliamentary democracy where coups, dictatorships and tyranny by the minority simply doesn’t occur. Discuss.”

University of Otago professor Robert Patman told a New Zealand newspaper that other countries are suspicious that Britain, which he described as gripped by its worst economic and diplomatic crisis since World War II, is behaving like a banana republic, and those suspicions have been deepened by Johnson’s latest actions.

“At the moment there’s a very dangerous situation in the U.K.,” he said.

Johnson’s suspension spawned protests in many British cities Saturday, a phenomenon familiar in Canada, where the queen is still the head of state. Former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper sparked major protests after he suspended Parliament in 2008 and 2009, but the protests eventually dwindled and he managed to remain in power despite a no-confidence vote accusing his government of contempt of Parliament.

The influential Toronto newspaper The Globe and Mail said in an editorial that Johnson’s suspension of Parliament must be reversed: “It’s wrong. It’s undemocratic. It certainly isn’t British,” the newspaper said.

A cartoon in the Toronto Star newspaper showed Johnson with the queen on a boat that’s about to go over a waterfall. Johnson says: “Hold on to your knickers, not even democracy can stop me now!”

The spectacle of Britain’s prolonged political impasse over Brexit, and now the decision to shutter Parliament at a key time, is contributing to a sense in Canada that the old colonial power is in decline.

Robert Bothwell, a University of Toronto professor of Canadian history, said Britain has been receding in the Canadian consciousness since the 1960s.

“There is about a 150-degree change in the way Canadians see Britain since the 1960s,” he said. “It’s not gone but it doesn’t exercise the same political economic draw as it did fifty years ago.”

/atm

source: newsinfo.inquirer.net

EU to provide free public 100Mbps Wi-Fi in 28 member states

The internet is one of the most indispensable   conveniences of the 21st-century lifestyle and yet access to it is not exactly free or affordable for many around the world. The EU plans to change this for European citizens through a program that will grant free public Wi-Fi for everyone.

Jean-Claude Juncker, current president of the European Union’s executive body, is pushing to provide free public Wi-Fi that reaches everywhere by 2020, reports ExtremeTech.

The public Wi-Fi project, or Wifi4EU, will have a minimum download speed of 100Mbps for all European households. Hospitals, administrations and other public services reliant on digital technologies will have a minimum of 1 GBps for upload and download. Finally, 5G access will be made uninterruptible on all major roads and railways.

Juncker’s plan also includes expenditure from the commission amounting to a maximum of €120 million to install the necessary equipment. It is presumed that municipalities will be shouldering maintenance costs and other ancillary expenses. However, it is worth noting that the EU has 28 member states and dividing €120 million will result in each country receiving only a little over €4 million from the commission to set up the facilities.

Apart from the infrastructure plan, Juncker also talked about having copyright protections for creators and artists whom he claims to be their “crown jewels.” He did allude to a set of controversial copyright laws  such as “Google tax” and the “YouTube rule.”

The vision for Wifi4EU is a grand one despite questions on how it can actually be done. If and when it does get implemented, it could prove to be a major development in the move to provide internet connectivity to every person on the planet.

READ: Terabit fiber optic technology gets closer to commercial use

On another note, researchers have made strides in making Terabit fiber optic technology more viable for commercial use. Perhaps Wifi4EU can benefit from this in the future.  Alfred Bayle

source: technology.inquirer.net