by Michael McHugh, PA
A post-Brexit trade agreement is still possible, Ireland’s foreign affairs minister said.
Simon Coveney said no deal would represent a failure of politics.
The Irish Government has said the British Government’s plans represents a “serious risk” to the peace process amid acrimony in the negotiations with the EU.
Mr Coveney told the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show: “Both the British and Irish economies are going to be damaged significantly and that will be a significant failure of politics not anything else.”
He said there were difficult times as countries recovered from Covid-19 but Britain and the EU needed to press on and reach an accord.
“It is possible to get agreement, it will probably be a basic pretty thin agreement.”
He dismissed the idea that Europe would block food deliveries to Northern Ireland.
“The British Government is behaving in an extraordinary way and British people need to know that, because outside of Britain the reputation of the UK as a trusted negotiating partner is being damaged.”
£8m to improve access to dentists announced by Health Minister
Fire at derelict hotel being treated as deliberate, police say
Man injured after house and three vehicles set alight in Co Antrim
IT system for Northern Ireland schools ‘largely restored’ following cyber attack
£100 home heating oil grant to be paid out by ‘summer at earliest’