After Brexit vote, EU presses U.K. for quick exit talks

Senior EU politicians demanded Saturday that the U.K. quickly cut its ties with the 28-nation bloc a process Britain says won't begin for several months as the political and economic shockwaves from the U.K.'s vote to leave reverberated around the world.

'Negotiations must take place in a businesslike, good climate,' says Angela Merkel

The Associated Press Posted: Jun 25, 2016 8:40 AM EDT | Last Updated: June 26, 2016

A Remain supporter stops to talk to people as he walks around London with a Europe flag. (Matt Dunham/Associated Press)

The European Union wants a quickie divorce, but Britain wants time to think things over.

"There is a certain urgency ... so that we don't have a period of uncertainty, with financial consequences, political consequences," French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said at a meeting in Berlin of the EU's six founding nations.

EU Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker warned that the split was "not an amicable divorce" but noted it was never "a tight love affair anyway."

EU officials implied that Britain need not send a formal letter to trigger the two-year countdown to its exit, rather Prime Minister David Cameron could start the process when he speaks at a European Council summit on Tuesday.

"'Triggering' ... could either be a letter to the president of the European Council or an official statement at a meeting of the European Council duly noted in the official records of the meeting," a council spokesman said Saturday.

A second EU official, asked about mounting frustration among leaders with Cameron's delay in delivering the formal notification required to launch divorce proceedings, said: "It doesn't have to be written. He can just say it."

The foreign ministers from six EU countries met in Berlin on Saturday. From the left, they are Jean Asselborn from Luxemburg, Paolo Gentiloni from Italy, Jean-Marc Ayrault from France, Frank-Walter Steinmeier from Germany, Didier Reynders from Belgium and Bert Koenders from the Netherlands. (Markus Schreiber/Associated Press)

Britons voted 52 to 48 per cent Thursday in favour of ending their country's 43-year membership in the EU.

But no country has ever left the EU before, so no one knows exactly how the process will play out. Britain must at some point unambiguously notify the bloc of its intentions. But until then, Britain remains an EU member.

Scotland pushes to stay

In contrast to the clamouring of EU officials, the leaders of Britain's Leave campaign, who had reassured voters that the EU would offer Britain good terms for a new relationship, were largely silent Saturday.

England's 300-year-old union with Scotland could be another casualty of the referendum, since most people in Scotland voted to remain in the EU but were outvoted by a majority in much-larger England.

Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon said Saturday that her semi-autonomous administration would seek immediate talks with EU nations and institutions to ensure that Scotland could remain in the bloc.

"[We will] explore possible options to protect Scotland's place in the EU," she said after meeting with her Cabinet in Edinburgh, adding that a new referendum on Scottish independence is "very much on the table."

Scotland voted in 2014 to remain a part of the U.K., but that decision was seen as being conditional on the U.K. staying in the EU.

The victorious Leave campaigners have said there's no rush to trigger Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty, which will begin the two-year exit process to renegotiate trade, business and political links between the U.K. and what will become a 27-nation bloc.

Cameron announced his resignation Friday and said his successor, to be chosen by October, should be the one to navigate the tricky process of withdrawing from the bloc.

The favourite to succeed him, former London Mayor Boris Johnson, has said there's "no need for haste" but EU leaders are saying the opposite, in insistent tones.

Juncker said Saturday the British had voted to leave and "it doesn't make any sense to wait until October to try and negotiate the terms of their departure."

"I would like to get started immediately," he said.

French Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron expressed the frustrations that many EU politicians feel, accusing Britain of taking the EU "hostage" with a referendum called to solve a domestic political problem: challenges to Cameron from right-wing euroskeptics.

"The failure of the British government" has opened up "the possibility of the crumbling of Europe," Macron said at a debate in Paris.

'There must be clarity'

Top diplomats from the European Union's six founding nations France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg met in Berlin for hastily arranged talks and stressed that the exit process should be speedy.

"There must be clarity," Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn told reporters. "The people have spoken and we need to implement this decision."

France's Ayrault suggested Britain could name a new prime minister within "several days" but that is likely instead to take several months. The process calls for Conservative lawmakers to winnow candidates down to two choices who will then be voted on in a postal ballot of party members.

Legally, there is little the EU can do to force Britain's hand, since Article 50 must be triggered by the country that is leaving. But political pressure and economic instability may force British politicians to act more quickly than they had hoped.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel speaks to the media following the U.K.'s referendum vote to leave the EU on June 24, 2016 in Berlin, Germany. (Carsten Koall/Getty Images)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel struck a conciliatory note, saying it "shouldn't take forever" for Britain to deliver its formal notification of leaving.

"There is no need to be particularly nasty in any way in the negotiations. They must be conducted properly," Merkel said at a news conference in Potsdam, outside Berlin.

Britain's Leave campaigners have been accused of lacking a plan for the aftermath of a victory.

Dominic Cummings, director of the "Vote Leave" group, said it would be "unthinkable" to invoke Article 50 before a new prime minister was in place. He tweeted: "David Cameron was quite right. New PM will need to analyze options and have informal talks."

Britain will remain an EU member until the divorce is finalized, but its influence inside the bloc is already waning. Leaders of the bloc will hold a summit in Brussels next week, and the second day, Wednesday, will take place for the first time without Britain.

On Saturday, Britain's representative on the EU's executive Commission, Jonathan Hill, stepped down, saying he was disappointed by the referendum result but "what's done cannot be undone."

Juncker transferred Hill's portfolio of overseeing financial services to Latvian commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis costing Britain a key voice in a sector that is hugely important to London, whose status as Europe's financial capital is threatened by Britain's EU exit.

Financial, political turmoil

The referendum has already triggered financial turmoil around the world. Stock markets plummeted Friday, with the Dow Jones industrial average dropping 611 points, or 3.4 per cent, its biggest fall since August. It's not clear what will happen in the markets on Monday, the next trading day.

The pound on Friday dropped to its lowest level since 1985, plunging more than 10 per cent from about $1.50 to $1.35 US before a slight recovery, on concerns that severing ties with the EU single market of 500 million people will hurt the U.K. economy and undermine London's position as a global financial center.

Credit rating agency Moody's downgraded the U.K.'s economic outlook from stable to negative, saying Britain faces "a prolonged period of uncertainty ... with negative implications for the country's medium-term growth outlook."

Jeremy Corbyn insisted publicly that he campaigned hard to keep the U.K. in the EU, but Labour sources have been quoted as saying he could have done more to support the Remain side. (Matt Cardy/Getty Images)

The vote to leave the EU has upended British politics. The deeply divided Conservatives are facing a leadership battle to replace Cameron, and some members of the opposition Labour Party hope to oust their leader, Jeremy Corbyn, who they accuse of failing to promote the Remain side strongly enough.

"[Corbyn] clearly isn't the right person to actually lead the party into an election because nobody thinks he will actually win," said Labour legislator Frank Field.

Corbyn said Saturday he would not resign and said Britain must react "calmly and rationally" to the divisive referendum result.

Despite Thursday's vote for an EU withdrawal, there is already calls to hold a second referendum.

More than 2.7 million people have added their names to apetition demanding that the U.K. parliament debate on holding another EU membership vote.

Online petitions which take little effort and are easy to game are poor measures of popular opinion, but any petition which draws more than 100,000 names must be considered for debate.

At one point Friday evening, the hugenumber of participants trying to sign the petition ended up crashingthe House of Commons website hosting the document.