Brexit would complicate Slovak presidency of EU Council: official

A Brexit would complicate Slovakia's presidency of the Council of the European Union (EU) in the second half of this year, announced Slovak foreign and European affairs minister Miroslav Lajcak on Tuesday.

The British referendum on the country's EU membership, set to take place on June 23, would "probably become a dominant issue for the entire EU, as well as for our presidency. I don't want to speculate about it, but it would be a kind of new and negative element that I can't and don't want to imagine at the moment," he said.

According to Lajcak, during the Slovak presidency, it will deal first and foremost with the financial-economic field as the talks on the EU's budget for next year await the presiding country. Talks on revising the multi-annual financial framework for 2014-2020 should be launched as well, and attention will also be paid to deepening the economic and monetary union.

The second order of business is deepening the EU's internal market, while the third issue will be dealing with migration, Lajcak said.

"This is a very comprehensive issue, which also bears positive aspects, such as making life easier for people who legally come to the Schengen area, and to the EU. There is, naturally, also the issue of meeting the EU-Turkey agreement and a discussion on the European Commission's proposal concerning a revision of the Dublin system," explained Lajcak.

Finally, Slovakia will focus on external relations. "the EU shouldn't pay attention only to itself, but should act as a global actor if we want to talk about the policy of enlargement and about maintaining its credibility," added Lajcak. Endit