Three ways EU could retaliate if UK ditches Northern Ireland protocol

theguardian.com:

The EU could impose tariffs on UK fish and agricultural goods in just seven days if Boris Johnson goes ahead with moves to disapply parts of the Northern Ireland Brexit protocol, legal experts have said.

The short, sharp shock is one of the three key retaliatory weapons available through the trade agreement, according to Catherine Barnard, a professor of EU law at Cambridge University.

These clauses allow the EU to terminate the entire trade agreement, spelling the end of tariff-free trade in both directions along with all the other elements of the deal, including 90-day visa-free holidays, and the fishing agreement.

It would essentially return the UK to a no-deal Brexit scenario, with damaging consequences including the suspension of police and security cooperation, a serious move with long-term consequences for EU-UK relations.

As this requires a year’s notice, it may not appeal to member states who want to show they have real teeth in the face of what they consider an act of bad faith by the UK.

This would allow the EU to suspend the trade parts of the TCA, leaving all the other areas agreed last December, including visa-free holidays and police cooperation, intact.

Again, this option may not appeal to member states as it would not deliver the practical objectives to demonstrate that the EU has teeth.

“It seems to me unlikely that they would do this because, frankly, if things have got so bad that the EU is talking about terminating part of the treaty it seems unlikely that they carry on cooperating in the other areas,” says Barnard.

This allows the EU to “suspend, in whole or in part”, access to its waters.

Such a response may have nothing to do with Northern Ireland, but Barnard says: “The advantage from the EU’s point of