Irish FM comments ahead of Brexit trade talks

The European Union on Tuesday gave its chief negotiator Michel Barnier a robust negotiating mandate to get a free trade deal with Britain, which counters several of the red lines that London has set.

Arriving at the meeting, Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said the EU was ready to open formal negotiations next week.

"We set a target to have a full negotiatingLON mandate concluded and ready and agreed across the EU by the end of this week and we're certainly on schedule to do that," he said.

The 27 EU nations are insisting that if Britain wants the best possible deal in the wake of its Brexit departure last month, it will have to adapt to EU rules and regulations on everything from state aid to environmental standards.

Britain has already rejected this, claiming the ability to diverge from EU rules is a key component of Brexit - supporters of Britain's departure from the bloc say the great dividend will lie in the repatriation of powers to London from Brussels for the benefit of the British economy.

Another stumbling block is the timetable. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson insists that a deal needs to be done by the end of the year so Britain can leave the EU's frictionless single market and customs union.

Britain remains within the EU's economic orbit until the end of 2020 to smooth its departure from the bloc.

That transition period can be extended once for up to two years but Johnson has said he won't be doing so.

British ministers were also gathering to finalize the U.K.’s negotiating mandate, which is due to be published on Thursday. Britain's chief U.K. trade negotiator David Frost said last week that the right to diverge from the bloc’s regulations was “the point of the whole project" to leave the EU.