'Enormous hostility' to new Brexit delay says Irish PM

Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar warned on Thursday there is "enormous hostility" in the European Union to allowing Britain to delay Brexit once again to seek new concessions from Brussels. Varadkar spoke as he arrived for an EU summit that could be the last for Prime Minister Theresa May, who has announced her resignation after failing to get her divorce deal approved by the UK parliament.

The European leaders met in Brussels as May's Conservative party looked like backing Boris Johnson, a former British foreign minister widely seen as unreliable in Brussels, as their favourite to take over as premier. "While I have endless patience, some of my (EU leader) colleagues have lost their patience... with the UK and there is enormous hostility to any further extension," Varadkar said.

"I think an extension could really only happen if it were to facilitate something like a general election in the UK or something like a second referendum if they decided to have one," he said. At an earlier summit in April, French President Emmanuel Macron argued against granting Britain an extension but was overturned by his more cautious EU counterparts, most notably Germany's Angela Merkel.

Varadkar said that such caution had now gone. "What won't be entertained is an extension for further negotiations or further indicative votes," he said, referring to a series of non-binding votes in UK parliament that failed to end the impasse.

"The time for that is long since past," he said. Luxembourg's Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, one of the UK's most vocal critics, warned that the rejected deal on the table was all that was on offer, even after the leadership in London changed.

"If they choose Boris Johnson, then he will have to deal with us on the agreement we have done with Theresa May," Bettel said. In recent campaign promises, Johnson suggested he could reopen May's exit deal and even ditch the "backstop" arrangement concerning Ireland, the most controversial aspect of the deal.

But he seemed to suggest he could negotiate a new arrangement with Ireland during a transition period after Brexit, and idea Varadkar dismissed. "There's no withdrawal agreement without a backstop and there's no implementation period without a withdrawal agreement," he said.