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Forget Trump, it is the European leaders that Boris Johnson should be cuddling up to at the G7

Inside Westminster: It is a Brexit deal – not a UK-US trade deal – that must concern the prime minister

Andrew Grice
Friday 23 August 2019 19:52 BST
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It appears that some of the most powerful people in this world do not understand that we exist in relation to others
It appears that some of the most powerful people in this world do not understand that we exist in relation to others

“Two sides can play the blame game.” Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron didn’t use these words as they smiled their way through their first meetings with Boris Johnson since he became prime minister. But the words reflect what the German and French leaders were really up to.

They judged that Johnson’s visits to Berlin and Paris were aimed at paving the way for him to blame the EU for a no-deal Brexit on 31 October. “This trip was all about his excuse: he tried for a deal but the unreasonable EU rejected it,” one European diplomat told me. The EU is right to smell a rat.

Yet I think Boris is still pursuing a twin-track approach: aim for a deal, but go hard for no deal if that doesn’t work. He will delay switching the points until the last possible moment.

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