Brexit issues

A key business lobby warned Britain's government on Feb. 13 not to play favorites among industries when it negotiates the country's exit from the European Union, saying that ignoring any sector would hurt the entire economy.

Great Britain will leave the common market of the EU; it will not make any significant contributions to the common budget; it will reject the jurisdiction of European courts and aim at a free-trade agreement and control over migration.

These were the main aims of Brexit, outlined by British PM Theresa May in a long-expected speech on the future of Great Britain and the EU.

While the migration crisis has tested the relationship between Turkey and the European Union, it has also shown the strength of those ties, Slovakia's ambassador to Turkey has said. 

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has taken to the pages of the London Times to tell squabbling UK politicians to leave Albania out of the acrimonious debate on Britain's EU membership.

British Home Secretary Theresa May has raised the issue of EU's expansion to include candidate countries like Albania, Serbia, and Turkey.

The high ranking official of Britain's ruling Conservative Party made the remarks during her speech on the so-called Brexit - an initiative for the country's withdrawal from the EU and the upcoming June referendum on the issue.

A recent headline in leading French newspaper Le Monde said it all: "Migrants, the Euro, Brexit: The European Union is mortal." And it's true. The EU could actually collapse over these three threats.

British finance minister George Osborne said a vote to leave the European Union would do permanent damage to the country's economy and could cost each household 4,300 pounds ($6,100) a year by 2030. 

President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an has voiced suspicions over whether the EU will fulfill its promises as part of the Ankara-Brussels migration agreement and grant Turkish citizens visa-free travel in the Schengen area. 

"I am leaving Bulgaria in two weeks as I just got a new job in the UK. But what will happen to me if Britain decide to leave the EU?," a young Bulgarian asked the British ambassador to Bulgaria, Emma Hopkins, at a debate on the future of the UK in the EU in Sofia on Monday.

Renowned cosmologist Stephen Hawking has joined more than 150 top scientists in calling for Britain to stay in the European Union, saying that leaving would be "a disaster for UK science and universities."