Both are correct.
If the UK doesn't participate in the elections they have to leave - as they physically can't be in the EU without having politicians in the EU. The EU's rules won't allow it. Potentially, anything passed by the EU parliament would be open to legal challenge as invalid. Effectivewly, not holding elections is a choice to leave.
If they do participate, they can stay until Halloween, with their full handful of political types in what is, effectively, a window-seat position. Some have threatened to use it as a screaming Trojan horse to disrupt the EU from the inside - but Nigel Farage has been screeching for years already with no change. Still, it would be an extraordinariy show of diplomatic bad faith to do so.
Importantly - the door is open. The ball firmly in Westminster's court.
If the UK wants to leave, it can. If it wants to stay and cancel it, it can. The problem is, Westminster can't figure out what the fuck it wants, or how it wants to do it, and has only just now started figuring that out a week
The EU is refusing to renegotiate the withdrawal agreement. Westminster still hasn't said what changes they would want- just that they don't want it. Westminster still may not have figured out that negotiations do not result in you getting everything you want - especially when you're the weakest Power on the table. The EU has all the rapport de force and is playing it the same way the side will overwhelming force plays it - the big stick is just not being shown simply because using it will be a rallying cry.
The EU's big game is being seen to be blameless in the clusterfuck. The rules are the rules, the process is bureaucratic rather than political - all the problems are on the UK's End. The one thing they don't want is a stab-in-the-back meme.
If the UK doesn't participate in the elections they have to leave - as they physically can't be in the EU without having politicians in the EU. The EU's rules won't allow it. Potentially, anything passed by the EU parliament would be open to legal challenge as invalid. Effectivewly, not holding elections is a choice to leave.
If they do participate, they can stay until Halloween, with their full handful of political types in what is, effectively, a window-seat position. Some have threatened to use it as a screaming Trojan horse to disrupt the EU from the inside - but Nigel Farage has been screeching for years already with no change. Still, it would be an extraordinariy show of diplomatic bad faith to do so.
Importantly - the door is open. The ball firmly in Westminster's court.
If the UK wants to leave, it can. If it wants to stay and cancel it, it can. The problem is, Westminster can't figure out what the fuck it wants, or how it wants to do it, and has only just now started figuring that out a week
The EU is refusing to renegotiate the withdrawal agreement. Westminster still hasn't said what changes they would want- just that they don't want it. Westminster still may not have figured out that negotiations do not result in you getting everything you want - especially when you're the weakest Power on the table. The EU has all the rapport de force and is playing it the same way the side will overwhelming force plays it - the big stick is just not being shown simply because using it will be a rallying cry.
The EU's big game is being seen to be blameless in the clusterfuck. The rules are the rules, the process is bureaucratic rather than political - all the problems are on the UK's End. The one thing they don't want is a stab-in-the-back meme.
Oh sweet meteor of death
Fall upon us.
Deliver us in fire
To Peace everlasting.
Fall upon us.
Deliver us in fire
To Peace everlasting.