Politics

• Thursday, July 21st 2016 - 08:07 UTC

  PM May announces in Germany negotiations for an “orderly departure” from EU this year

  

  Prime Minister Theresa May has said the UK will not begin official negotiations on leaving the EU this year as she held talks with Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel. Speaking in Berlin on Wednesday, the PM said securing a “sensible and orderly departure” from the EU would take time, but she insisted the UK would not “walk away” from Europe and wanted to retain the “closest economic links”.

• Thursday, July 21st 2016 - 07:20 UTC

  Gibraltar begins domestic round of assessment to determine impact of no access to EU membership

  

  The Gibraltar government has started an assessment to determine the impact of not having access to membership of the European Union and of the consequences of an exit. The assessment will look at every area of government business with Chief Minister Fabian Picardo asking all ministers to look at every sphere of their ministerial responsibilities and report back to him and to the Deputy Chief Minister by the end of August.

• Thursday, July 21st 2016 - 07:12 UTC

  UK pledges a consultative process on Brexit between London and BOTs

  

  Leaders from the British Overseas Territories meeting in the Turks and Caicos Islands, TCI, this week heard that the UK will not forget them once it begins its negotiations to exit the European Union, according to the Caribbean media.

• Thursday, July 21st 2016 - 07:09 UTC

  Baroness Anelay new Foreign Office minister for Overseas Territories

  

  Baroness Joyce Anne Anelay is the new Foreign and Commonwealth Office Minister for the British Overseas Territories. On 19 July the UK Government announced Baroness Anelay’s appointment in the Theresa May-led administration. She replaces James Duddridge.

• Wednesday, July 20th 2016 - 06:54 UTC

  Half of Brazilians prefer Temer to remain as president until the 2018 election

  

  Half of Brazilians would like to see interim President Michel Temer stay in the job until the next election in 2018, compared with 32% who desire the return of suspended President Dilma Rousseff, according to a Datafolha poll published this weekend on the Folha de S.Paulo website.

• Wednesday, July 20th 2016 - 06:35 UTC

  Rousseff's great mistake was to allow Venezuela into Mercosur, says Brazilian minister

  

  Brazil committed a great mistake on supporting Venezuela to the Mercosur trade agreement back in 2012, and the country must be impeded from taking over the pro-tempore presidency of the group until it complies with all the requisites to be a full member, said Brazil's foreign minister Jose Serra.

• Wednesday, July 20th 2016 - 05:25 UTC

  Falklands must be involved in a tripartite dialogue, if Argentina's new policy is to be positive

  

  Argentina's collaboration strategy towards the UK and the Falkland Islands, if it means integrating the Islanders in any discussions relative to their lives and future, which is only of their concern, “this is positive”, according to Gibraltar Chief Minister Fabian Picardo, interviewed by Argentina's official news agency Telam.

• Wednesday, July 20th 2016 - 03:56 UTC

  Theresa May begins tour of European capitals: Wednesday with Merkel, Thursday with Hollande

  

  British Prime Minister Theresa May on Wednesday will take off for her first tour of European capitals visiting Germany and France where she anticipated discussions about the UK leaving the EU must be “frank and open”. The prime minister will have a working dinner with Germany's Angela Merkel on Wednesday before talks with France's Francois Hollande on Thursday.

• Wednesday, July 20th 2016 - 03:50 UTC

  Rajoy closer to forming a coalition; ally gets speaker's job defeating Socialists

  

  Lawmakers on Tuesday picked a close ally of Mariano Rajoy as parliamentary speaker as Spain's acting prime minister cast around for coalition partners following last month's inconclusive general election. Public Works Minister Anta Pastor, 58, got the speaker's job under a deal between Rajoy's conservative Popular Party (PP) and market-friendly upstarts Ciudadanos, who came in fourth in the June 26 polls.

• Wednesday, July 20th 2016 - 03:47 UTC

  García Margallo wants Gibraltar out of Brexit talks; insists on a face to face meeting with Johnson

  

  Caretaker Spanish Foreign Minister, Jose Manuel Garcia Margallo, says he will be raising Gibraltar with the UK’s new Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson when they meet in London ‘soon’. The two had a fleeting encounter at a Brussels Summit on Monday during which the Gibraltar issue was mentioned briefly.