France’s Macron: unclear if EU-Britain to have trade deal by year-end

February 22, 2020

PARIS (Reuters) – French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday cast doubt over the likelihood of the European Union and Britain reaching a post-Brexit trade deal by the end of the year, saying he expected fishing talks to be very tough.

“It’s going to be tense because they are very tough…Boris Johnson has a card in his hand and it is fishing and with that he will try to gain access to the market,” Macron told representatives of the French fishing industry at a farm show in Paris.

“It is not certain that we will have a global deal by the end of the year.”

(Reporting by Gus Trompiz, Dominique Vidalon; Editing by Alex Richardson)