The EU remains committed to the full implementation by the United Kingdom of the terms of the divorce agreement with the EU on Northern Ireland. EU Commissioner Maros Sefcovic says that the European Commission is not withdrawing the legal proceedings it has started on this matter.

Sefcovic, who oversees the implementation of the EU’s withdrawal agreement with the UK government due to the UK’s departure from the EU on 1 January, received its UK counterpart David Frost in Brussels on Thursday evening to talk about Northern Ireland.

“Only solutions to trade issues that we agree on together are acceptable,” says Sefcovic, including the deadlines of the agreements.

The EU launched a legal process last month because London unilaterally decided to postpone until 1 October the introduction of controls on goods shipped from British soil to Northern Ireland. It was agreed that this would start on 1 April. The controls on incoming goods in Northern Ireland ports and Belfast Airport are necessary because the British Northern Ireland remained part of the European internal market after Brexit.

The British government says in a statement on Friday that intensive negotiations between both sides in recent weeks have led to greater clarity and ‘positive momentum’. But more in-depth contacts are needed in the coming weeks, says Frost.