EU Parliament approves EU-UK trade deal

By Agnes Szucs

BRUSSELS (AA) – The European Parliament announced on Wednesday that it had formally adopted the agreement on the future relationship between the EU and UK.

The European Parliament approved with an overwhelming majority – 660 votes in favor, five against, and 32 abstentions – the trade and cooperation agreement between the bloc and the UK, the EU institution announced in a press statement.

The EU lawmakers cast their votes remotely on Tuesday, but the results were announced on Wednesday.

The UK officially quit the EU after 47 years of membership on Jan. 31, 2020, but it took the partners nearly a year to agree on future economic ties.

The trade agreement, reached on Dec. 24 and approved now by the European Parliament, involves zero quotas and zero tariffs for trade with strict requirements on fair competition rules for economic operators.

For practical reasons, the deal has already been applied over the past four months.

The trade agreement is expected to officially enter into force on May 1 after the approval of the Council of the European Union representing the EU governments.

In a separate, legally non-binding resolution, EU lawmakers called Brexit a “historic mistake” and expressed regret over the UK’s decision on rejecting security and foreign policy cooperation, as well as ending student exchange Erasmus+ programs.

The European Parliament also warned the UK to respect the Withdrawal Agreement, especially its Protocol on Northern Ireland.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson welcomed the ratification of the trade agreement in a Twitter post.

“Now is the time to look forward to a new relationship with the EU and a more Global Britain,” he added to his message.

Britain voted to leave the EU in a hotly contested referendum in 2016.

It took three years for the EU and the UK government to strike a deal on the conditions of leaving the EU.

The Withdrawal Agreement contains a special trade regime on Northern Ireland that the UK has been contesting since last September.