Alwaght- Britain will commence the process of leaving the European Union on March 29, launching two years of complex talks to complete the most important negotiation for a generation.
Prime Minister Theresa May will file separation papers to leave the EU more than 40 years after the UK joined the EU and nine months since it voted to quit it.
Britain’s envoy to the bloc, Tim Barrow, informed EU President Donald Tusk on Monday of May's plan to invoke Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, the mechanism for quitting that has never been used.
"We are on the threshold of the most important negotiation for this country for a generation," Brexit secretary David Davis said.
"The government is clear in its aims: a deal that works for every nation and region of the UK and indeed for all of Europe - a new, positive partnership between the UK and our friends and allies in the European Union."
The letter May sends next week will plunge Britain into a period of intense uncertainty.
The country doesn't know what its future relationship with the bloc will look like - whether businesses will freely be able to trade, students can study abroad or pensioners will be allowed to retire with ease in other EU states.
England’s 310-year-old union with Scotland is also in jeopardy, while the border separating Northern Ireland -- a U.K. province -- from the Republic of Ireland could become a hard one.
The EU is “ready to begin negotiations,” European Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas told reporters in Brussels. The pound fell 0.2 percent to $1.2378 as of 12:15 p.m. London time. It earlier touched $1.2436, the strongest level this month.
Meanwhile, hate crimes in Britain have risen to record numbers in the three months following Britain’s referendum to exit the EU. On June 23, 2016, 17.4 million Britons voted to end their 43-year-old membership of the European Union — a proportion of 52 per cent to 48 per cent.
