EU's Barnier says UK must be clearer on Brexit as talks continue

The UK must be clearer in its positions on leaving the European Union, Michel Barnier, the bloc's chief negotiator in the withdrawal negotiations said.

The third round of talks between the two sides started in Brussels on Monday at 5 pm local time. They are expected to continue until Thursday.

"We need UK papers that are clear," Barnier said on Twitter. "We need (the) UK position on all separation issues. The sooner we remove the ambiguity, the sooner we will be in a position to discuss the future relationship."

Britons voted in a referendum on June 23, 2016 to leave the EU. UK Prime Minster Theresa May triggered article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty in March 2017, which set off the two-year negotiation process to complete talks with the EU about the terms of the withdrawal.     

Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament's Brexit coordinator repeated on Twitter the EU's stance.

He said the priority issues of  citizens' rights, the so-called divorce bill -- the amount Britain is expected to pay towards EU commitments already made, among other things -- and the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland must be settled before details of the post-Brexit relationship are discussed.

 The UK has issued a series of position papers, including five last week. They cover issues including how the Luxembourg-based European Court of Justice will no longer have "direct" jurisdiction over British laws, data protection and confidentiality of documents.

On Ireland, the UK has said  it would not seek a 'hard border'. That would mean no passport controls or immigration checks would be carried out. That will be the only land frontier between the UK and the EU post-Brexit. 

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told EU diplomats he is disappointed in the way the British have presented their case, AFP reported.

"I have read with all necessary attention all the position papers drawn up by the UK government but none of them really give me satisfaction, so there is an enormous amount of questions that need to be resolved," AFP reported Juncker as saying.

The European Commission is the EU's executive arm.

UK Brexit secretary David Davis has called for "flexibility and imagination" in the talks.

Our position papers "are products of the hard work and detailed thinking that has been going on behind the scenes, not just in the last few weeks but in the last twelve months," Davis said at the start of the latest talks. "The week ahead is about driving forward the technical discussions across all the issues."

The British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) and the Association of German Chambers of Commerce (DIHK) said in a statement on Monday that political leaders must "deliver clarity and certainty for trading businesses across Europe."

(Alistair Holloway, alistair.holloway@wort.lu, +352 49 93 739)