Marine Le Pen accuses EU of trying to spark CIVIL WAR in Ireland to punish UK for Brexit

Mlle Le Pen, head of the populist Rassemblement national (RN) party, told the news channel BFMTV: “The European Union, in truth, is looking to recreate a form of civil war in Ireland … to reignite the existing conflict there. “I can confirm this, I know this, and it is very dangerous and reveals the EU’s tactics.” Asked by her interviewer how a conflict-torn Ireland would serve the EU’s interests, she said: “Why would Europe do this? “Well, to punish the British people for Brexit. They need to be punished, and Brussels wants the divorce to be as painful as possible. “The divorce is likely to be very painful, but it will be a lot more painful for Europe than for the UK.” Once a fierce advocate for a “Frexit,” or French exit from the EU, Mlle Le Pen was forced to tone down her anti-Europe rhetoric after her crushing defeat to liberal europhile Emmanuel Macron in the May 2017 presidential elections.

With less than two months until Britain is due by law to leave the Brussels bloc on March 29, there is no agreement yet in London on how the UK will leave the world’s largest trading bloc after Parliament defeated Theresa May’s deal last month by a huge margin.

Lawmakers instructed her to return to Brussels to renegotiate the arrangements for the post-Brexit border between the British province of Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland.

The backstop is an insurance policy that aims to prevent the reintroduction of a hard border, a key part of a 1998 peace deal that ended decades of lethal sectarian conflict, and preserve frictionless trade.

The withdrawal agreement Mrs May struck in November with the bloc’s remaining 27 members says the UK will remain in a customs union “unless and until” “alternative arrangements” are found to avoid a hard border by the end of the transition period, which could last between 21 months and four years.

But critics and Brexiteers argue that the backstop mechanism could handcuff the UK to the EU’s customs union indefinitely and prevent Britain from striking its own international trade deals.

Lawmakers in Mrs May’s party want her to drop the backstop and replace it with something else, a request bluntly rejected by Brussels.

Speaking immediately after the vote, a spokesman for European Council President Donald Tusk said the backstop was part of the withdrawal deal and not up for negotiation.

Mr Tusk said via his spokesman: “The withdrawal agreement is and remains the best and only way to ensure an orderly withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union.”

The bloc’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, for his part, said that the backstop provision could not be time-limited, since that would defeat its purpose of guaranteeing there is no physical border between the two neighbours.

Mr Barnier told Germany’s DLF public radio: “We have to maintain the credibility of this reassurance.

“It cannot be time-limited. It’s not just about Ireland.”

The European stance was echoed by the Irish government.

Irish European Affairs minister Helen McEntee said: “This is a deal which was negotiated with the UK, signed off by the UK and the prime minister – and now it looks as though … there is a row-back and a reneging on the commitments that were made.”

Brussels said last month it would consider such a customs union to be a “suboptimal” trading relationship if it is triggered.

Should it come about, it pledged to have six-monthly summits to check on progress on an alternative arrangement to replace it, such as a comprehensive trade deal.

If Parliament cannot find a majority for a way forward, Britain will leave the EU without a deal, a scenario that could bring economic disorder and create chaos at the borders.