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WORLD NEWS Wednesday 18 May 2022
UK raises stakes in EU feud with threat to break Brexit deal

By JILL LAWLESS other parties in Northern
Associated Press Ireland want to keep it, with
LONDON (AP) — The British tweaks to ease the burden
government dramatically on businesses.
escalated a fight with the Johnson says his govern-
European Union on Tues- ment wants to fix the Proto-
day by saying it will pass col rather than rip it up.
a law to scrap parts of the The U.K. says technology
trade treaty signed by the and trusted-trader pro-
two sides less than two grams could be used to to
years ago. create a check-free “green
Britain says its move to sin- lane” for goods destined
glehandedly change the for Northern Ireland that
legally binding treaty an are at little risk of entering
apparent breach of inter- the EU.
national law is an insur- The British government
ance policy in case it can’t hopes its threat of legis-
reach agreement with the lation which would take
bloc to end a long-running months to pass through
dispute over post-Brexit Parliament will increase
trade rules. pressure on the EU to com-
“Our preference is to reach promise.
a negotiated outcome Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson with a Mark 3 shoulder launch LML (Lightweight Multiple “What that actually in-
with the EU,” Foreign Secre- Launcher) missile system, at Thales weapons manufacturer in Belfast, Monday May 16, 2022, volves is getting rid of some
tary Liz Truss said. during a visit to Northern Ireland. relatively minor barriers to
The announcement drew Associated Press trade,” Johnson said Tues-
a sharp response from the goes ahead with the bill. keep the Irish land border Irish Sea. The Democratic day. “I think there are good,
EU, which has long ac- Truss told lawmakers in the free of customs posts and Unionist Party, Northern Ire- common sense, pragmatic
cused Prime Minister Boris House of Commons that other checks, because an land’s biggest unionist par- solutions.
Johnson of trying to wriggle the move “is consistent with open border is a key pillar ty, is blocking the formation We need to work with our
out of a deal that his gov- our obligations in interna- of the peace process that of a power-sharing region- EU friends to achieve that.”
ernment negotiated and tional law.” ended decades of vio- al government in Belfast, The bloc insists the treaty
signed as part of the U.K.’s She said the bill will be pub- lence in Northern Ireland. which should have been can’t be renegotiated,
exit in 2020. The spat raises lished in the coming weeks, Instead, to protect the EU’s formed after the election though it is willing to be flex-
the chances of a trade war and she hopes to keep up single market, there are this month, until the cus- ible about how the rules are
between Britain and the talks with the bloc in the checks on some goods, toms checks are scrapped. implemented. The EU could
27-nation bloc that is even meantime. such as meat and eggs, Like the DUP, the British gov- hit back with legal action,
after Brexit its major eco- Britain’s Conservative gov- entering Northern Ireland ernment argues that the and potentially trade sanc-
nomic partner. ernment says post-Brexit from the rest of the U.K. trade regulations, known tions, if Britain doesn’t back
“Unilateral actions con- trade rules are hurting the The arrangement is op- as the Northern Ireland down. Critics of Johnson’s
tradicting an international economy and undermining posed by British unionists in Protocol, are destabilizing government say a U.K.-EU
agreement are not ac- peace in Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland, who say a peace agreement that feud is the last thing Europe
ceptable,” said EU Vice the only part of the U.K. the new checks have put a relies on support from both needs as it seeks unity in re-
President Maroš Šefčovič, that shares a border with burden on businesses and Protestant unionist and sponse to Russia’s invasion
the bloc’s top Brexit official. an EU member state. frayed the bonds between Catholic nationalist com- of Ukraine, and risks dam-
He said the EU “will need to When Britain left the bloc Northern Ireland and the munities. aging the British economy
respond with all measures and its borderless free-trade rest of the U.K. by creating While the DUP wants the amid a worsening cost-of-
at its disposal” if the U.K. zone, a deal was agreed to a customs border in the Protocol scrapped, most living crisis. q

Heavy rains trigger floods in northeast

India, killing 11

By WASBIR HUSSAIN were either blocked by Seven other people were
Associated Press landslides or washed away. reported killed in neighbor-
GAUHATI, India (AP) — At The army deployed heli- ing Assam. The state’s di-
least 11 people have died copters to help with rescue saster management agen-
in floods and mudslides efforts. cy said nearly 700 villages
triggered by heavy rains in Officials said four people were underwater.
India’s remote northeast re- were killed Monday follow- The Indian Meteorological
gion, officials said Tuesday. ing heavy rain and mud- Department forecast very
Several railway stations slides in the region’s frontier heavy to extremely heavy
were closed because state of Arunachal Pradesh. rain in the region for the People inspect the area of a landslide after heavy rainfall in
of floods, said Nazreen Two others died when their next four days. Dima Hasao district, in the northeastern Indian state of Assam,
Monday, May 16, 2022.
Ahmed, a senior official in houses on a small hillock Landslides and floods are Associated Press
Assam’s Dima Hasao dis- collapsed in the state’s common in India’s Hima-
trict. She said nearly 200,000 capital, Itanagar, and two layan north. Scientists say of glaciers there. tarakhand state. In 2013,
people in the district were road construction workers they are becoming more In 2020, flash floods killed thousands of people were
cut off from the rest of the were killed by mudslides at frequent as global warming nearly 200 people and killed in floods there.q
state as roads and bridges another location. contributes to the melting washed away houses in Ut-