Displaying items by tag: negotiations

Thursday, 12 January 2023 21:13

Potential new offer to health workers

Health secretary Steve Barclay will hold another round of talks with union leaders ahead of planned strikes by nurses. Whitehall said ministers were working on options for resolving the strikes, which could include a one-off payment to reflect cost of living pressures. They recognised that union leaders ‘have to get something for this year’ before they will consider calling off the current wave of industrial action. What level of payment might be offered, and how it could be funded, is not yet clear. There are also concerns that any payment to resolve the health dispute would set a precedent for other sectors facing industrial strife, including education and transport, potentially landing the taxpayer with a bill running into billions of pounds. The moves came as 25,000 ambulance workers staged a second day of walkouts and unions warned they could boycott talks on the next pay round in April.

Published in British Isles
Friday, 09 September 2022 10:05

UK / Ireland Brexit deadlock

Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern have been working behind the scenes to get the UK and EU back to the negotiating table over Brexit and the Stormont government collapse. Hard Brexiter Steve Baker has been transferred to the Northern Ireland office, replacing Conor Burns, who went to the Department for International Trade. UK-EU protocol talks were paused when Russia invaded Ukraine. The already strained relations deteriorated further in June when Liz Truss introduced a bill enabling the UK to remove some Northern Ireland Brexit protocol. Hopes of a thaw in UK-EU relations have been fuelled by the absence of Lord Frost from Truss’s new cabinet. Burns met Europe’s Marcus Šefčovič at the weekend and had ‘constructive and prolonged talks’. He told MPs, ‘I am convinced that if the appetite exists, we can find a way to a negotiated solution to the Northern Ireland protocol.’ 

Published in Europe
Thursday, 13 January 2022 20:23

Ukraine: discussions to defuse tensions

Officials from Russia and the United States have been holding security talks in Geneva, in a week of diplomatic activity to defuse tensions over Ukraine. Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov and his delegation have begun face-to-face discussions with Wendy Sherman, the US deputy secretary of state, and her team. Ms Sherman is one of the world's most powerful diplomats, nicknamed the Silver Fox because of her snowy white mane and canny deal-making style. Pray that their meetings will kickstart dialogue between Moscow and Washington, whose relations are at a low point over Russia’s military buildup near Ukraine. The negotiations have been particularly gruelling, say analysts, and Ms Sherman will need all the diplomatic tricks she can muster to avoid a major war in Europe. Sergei Ryabkov brings a list of demands the US officials must agree to, including not expanding NATO forces eastward or allowing Ukraine to join NATO. See also the next article and

Published in Europe
Friday, 03 December 2021 09:39

Iran: nuclear deal talks

On 29 November, senior diplomats from Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia met Iranian officials in Vienna to discuss bringing Tehran back into compliance with the 2015 deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which eased sanctions on Iran in return for curbs on its nuclear programme. The talks could pave the way for the US to rejoin the accord. Israel is making efforts to stop a return to the previous agreement and prevent implementing an interim agreement, a plan the US is considering as a stop-gap if a full agreement cannot be reached. The nuclear talks resumed with upbeat comments despite Tehran's negotiating team demanding that all US and EU sanctions imposed since 2017, including those unrelated to its nuclear programme, be removed.

Published in Worldwide
Friday, 07 May 2021 10:00

UK and Iran in talks over debt

Last week you prayed for the UK to settle the debt they owe to Iran, so that Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe can finally be released from prison. Please keep praying. This week the UK and Iran are in discussions over the £400m that the UK owes for failing to deliver tanks Iran bought in the 1970s. Nazanin believes she has been imprisoned as leverage for the debt. Boris Johnson said ministers were doing ‘everything we can to look after her interests and all the very difficult dual national cases we have in Tehran’. On 1 May Iranian state TV suggested the UK had paid the debt - but the Government said nothing had changed.

Published in British Isles

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has been sentenced to a further year in prison and a one-year travel ban after being found guilty of joining a London protest twelve years ago and speaking to the BBC Persian service. Her husband said she has not been taken to prison yet; she plans to appeal against the sentence. Mr Ratcliffe said, ‘The threat is there, and it is bigger than we were fearing. I think the worst case got a bit closer.’ He maintains that his wife was imprisoned as leverage for a debt owed by the UK over its failure to deliver tanks to Iran in 1979; also, her case may be caught up with the negotiations over limiting Iran's nuclear material enrichment. Her sentence may indicate that the Iranian regime is unhappy with the negotiations taking place in Vienna. Things could get worse for Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe and other jailed dual nationals.

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 08 April 2021 21:03

Iran: negotiations for nuclear deal

Last week we prayed for the nations to work towards ending Iran’s history of making weapons-grade nuclear material in underground facilities while denying their existence. This week the USA has joined talks in Vienna aimed at reviving the Iran nuclear deal which the Trump administration abandoned in 2018. Acting as intermediaries, officials from the UK, France, and Germany are shuttling between two hotels in the Austrian capital. Diplomats from the two other remaining parties, Russia and China, are also attending. President Biden has said he wants to return to the landmark accord. But the six remaining states need to find a way for him to lift the sanctions imposed by his predecessor and for Iran to return to the agreed limits on its nuclear programme. Iran has said it will not meet the USA face to face until that happens.

Published in Worldwide
Thursday, 17 December 2020 18:45

Brexit: race against time

Stripping away the spin in both the UK and EU, the prospects of a deal feel very slim at present. In the next few weeks everything rests on intense negotiations behind the scenes. The process is unlikely to be straightforward as this is all uncharted territory. Please continue to pray for God to direct every conversation around this challenging situation. Pray for everyone to be creative and able to keep the basis of negotiations on level ground. Political observers say that if they wanted to, the EU and the UK could, in theory, come up with an agreement outside EU law. Meanwhile the UK and USA are in talks over a mini trade deal to reduce tariffs. Pray for the success of post-Brexit deals with Washington. Pray for God to pave the way for excellent future communications between US trade representative Robert Lighthizer and the UK international trade secretary Liz Truss. See

Published in British Isles
Thursday, 03 December 2020 20:34

Barnier warns Boris over fishing and finance

Michel Barnier has warned Brexit trade talks could be plunged into ‘crisis’ if Boris Johnson puts forward more legislation that calls into question last year's divorce deal. The Brussels diplomat is worried that the Finance Bill will contain clauses that breach the terms of the Northern Ireland protocol. He was infuriated when No 10 tabled legislation that handed ministers the powers to rip up sections of the Withdrawal Agreement relating to Northern Ireland. Mr Barnier made the warning during a video call with EU27 ambassadors. At the time of writing the future UK-EU relationship is still deadlocked because of disagreements over post-Brexit fishing rights and common standards, and Downing Street has yet to decide on a timetable for publishing the Finance Bill. Talks went on late into the evening on 2 December at the business department in central London. See

Published in Europe
Thursday, 26 November 2020 20:16

EU willing to be 'creative' to seal Brexit deal

Ursula von der Leyen said the EU is willing to be ‘creative’ to get a deal with the UK and that European interests will best be served by leaders backing any compromise that emerges. There is concern among member states that the UK might successfully push the commission into making concessions which will give British businesses an advantage in the marketplace over the decades to come. Ms von der Leyen said she trusted Michel Barnier’s ‘skilful steer’. The EU’s chief negotiator is expected to go to London on 27 November in a last-ditch push for an agreement. ‘These are decisive days for negotiations with the United Kingdom’, von der Leyen said; ‘I cannot tell you today if in the end, there will be a deal.’ She said the commission’s negotiating team was open-minded as to how to bridge the gaps between the two sides, but that they were holding firm on key principles.

Published in Europe
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