AFP, Hangzhou :
New British leader Theresa May sought to start shaping her country’s post-EU access to world markets on Monday, but faced a Japanese warning over the fallout from Brexit and the US saying it was not its first priority. In the wake of its vote to leave the European Union, Britain must renegotiate its access to world markets, an issue currently handled by Brussels.
It is a huge task for the world’s fifth biggest economy. May met Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on the sidelines of a G20 summit in China, saying that Australia had “already been engaged in discussions with you about what the free trade agreements may look like”, following Britain’s EU exit.
That could upset European leaders, after EU commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker said he opposes trade talks between Britain and other economies while it remains part of the European Union.
“I don’t like the idea that member states of the EU, including those who are still a member state of the European Union, are negotiating free trade agreements,” he said on Sunday.
Such discussions were an “exclusive matter” for the European Union on behalf of its members and “we are sticking to it”, he told reporters.
According to EU officials, formal negotiations with Brussels itself cannot start until London triggers Article 50, the treaty provision governing its up to two-year-long departure from the grouping.
The uncertainty is weighing on businesses and investors, and when May met her Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe on the sidelines of the summit he asked for her ensure the environment for Japanese companies remained as “transparent and predictable as possible”, a Japanese official told AFP.
The comments came after Tokyo delivered a strong warning about Brexit.
More than 1,000 Japanese companies do business in Britain, employing some 140,000 local people, many of them lured by the access the country offered to the EU and its single market of hundreds of millions of consumers.
Some of Japan’s best-known companies, including Toyota, Hitachi and investment bank Nomura, were re-assessing their investments after the shock referendum result in June, the government said.
New British leader Theresa May sought to start shaping her country’s post-EU access to world markets on Monday, but faced a Japanese warning over the fallout from Brexit and the US saying it was not its first priority. In the wake of its vote to leave the European Union, Britain must renegotiate its access to world markets, an issue currently handled by Brussels.
It is a huge task for the world’s fifth biggest economy. May met Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull on the sidelines of a G20 summit in China, saying that Australia had “already been engaged in discussions with you about what the free trade agreements may look like”, following Britain’s EU exit.
That could upset European leaders, after EU commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker said he opposes trade talks between Britain and other economies while it remains part of the European Union.
“I don’t like the idea that member states of the EU, including those who are still a member state of the European Union, are negotiating free trade agreements,” he said on Sunday.
Such discussions were an “exclusive matter” for the European Union on behalf of its members and “we are sticking to it”, he told reporters.
According to EU officials, formal negotiations with Brussels itself cannot start until London triggers Article 50, the treaty provision governing its up to two-year-long departure from the grouping.
The uncertainty is weighing on businesses and investors, and when May met her Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe on the sidelines of the summit he asked for her ensure the environment for Japanese companies remained as “transparent and predictable as possible”, a Japanese official told AFP.
The comments came after Tokyo delivered a strong warning about Brexit.
More than 1,000 Japanese companies do business in Britain, employing some 140,000 local people, many of them lured by the access the country offered to the EU and its single market of hundreds of millions of consumers.
Some of Japan’s best-known companies, including Toyota, Hitachi and investment bank Nomura, were re-assessing their investments after the shock referendum result in June, the government said.
