The European Commission published the legal text of the withdrawal agreement on Wednesday morning.
LONDON — The European Union has formally called for Northern Ireland to remain within its customs territory and stick to single market rules after Brexit if a hard Irish border cannot be avoided.
The EU has set out Northern Ireland staying aligned to its rules and regulations as the "backstop" option if Theresa May cannot come up with a way of avoiding a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, in a legal text of the withdrawal agreement published on Wednesday morning.
The 120-page proposes a "common regulatory area" with "no internal barriers" on the island of Ireland which would allow frictionless trade to continue across the border.
The suggested "common regulatory area" is detailed in scope, covering customs, VAT, energy, agriculture and the environment among other areas. Under the EU's proposal, it would be under the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice, which will rile Brexiteers both within May's Cabinet and elsewhere in the Conservative Party.
The text also calls for the ECJ to rule on any disputes that arise over the application and interpretation of the withdrawal agreement between the EU and UK government.
"They [the Commission] know the political risks of this but have run out of patience waiting for coherent proposals from the UK," a well-placed Brussels source told Business Insider.
Here are some key paragraphs from the text:
The text, which was briefed to Business Insider on Tuesday evening, does not explicitly call for Northern Ireland to stay in the single market if the UK government fails to come up with a workable solution, but lays out areas where it could stay fully aligned with single market rules in order to preserve the invisible border.
The proposals come as a leaked letter revealed that the Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has privately admitted that Brexit could cause a hard border with Ireland.
Johnson privately told May that preventing a hard border should not be the main aim of the UK government.
Prime Minister May is reportedly preparing a "robust" fight-back against the EU's proposal.
A senior Downing Street source told The Times: "We are fully committed to implementing the December agreement but the EU should be absolutely clear that the prime minister is not going to sign up to anything that threatens the constitutional integrity of the UK or its common market."
Former Brexit minister David Jones accused the EU of trying to "annex" Northern Ireland in an interview with BBC Radio 4 on Wednesday morning. "The EU are living in fantasy land if they think this is something we could ever accept," he added.