EU parliament president Schulz says bloc wants UK out 'as soon as possible'

EU Parliament President Martin Schulz told Britain to start negotiations to quit the bloc "as soon as possible", after outgoing Prime Minister David Cameron said Friday he would leave the negotiations to his successor.

“Uncertainty is the opposite of what we need,” Schulz said, according to the Guardian newspaper.

It is hard to accept, he continued, that “a whole continent is taken hostage because of an internal fight in the Tory party”.

“I doubt it is only in the hands of the government of the United Kingdom,” he said, adding that “We have to take note of this unilateral declaration that they want to wait until October, but that must not be the last word.”

Earlier in the day Schulz, EU president Donald Tusk, European Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker, and Dutch premier Mark Rutte, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the bloc, held crisis talks in Brussels. After the talks they issued a joint statement saying that the UK should respect the decision of it's people as soon as possible, "however painful that process may be."

"Any delay would unnecessarily prolong uncertainty."...
 [i24news.tv]
24/6/16