Press

The bizarre dynamic, experts warn, is likely to leave Putin emboldened after the meeting in Helsinki. “What generates stability is that your adversary knows that doing anything stupid will be met with a costly response,” Ian Bond, a former British diplomat in Moscow, told me. “So to the extent that they’re given a pass, you’re encouraging them to do it again and that is increasing instability.”

Ian Bond, a former British diplomat in Moscow who is now director for foreign policy at the Centre for European Reform, a research group in London, said he would normally cheer any chance for leaders to sit down and hash out their problems.

And when even liberal voices such as Charles Grant of the London-based Centre for European Reform talks about it being unacceptable to having a deal with the EU like Norway because that would make the UK a “vassal state,” it goes to show one sad fact: The UK is still very long on imperial attitudes – and very short on realism.

 “Future arrangements will complicate the fact that the US and the EU adhere to different regulatory standards, said research staff of the Centre for European Reform, Beth Oppenheim and Christian Odendahl. According to analysts, the standards of food production in America are lower than in the EU, so the United States has long been calling for barriers to be removed in this sector. "If Britain intends to adhere to pan-European standards, the United States will have less incentive to complete the trade deal," experts concluded.”

Sam Lowe, a trade expert at the Centre for European Reform think-tank, said: “If the UK remains bound by the EU’s approach to plant and animal health it will remain unable to address many of the concerns laid out by India, potentially making a far-reaching free trade agreement all the more difficult.”