A new chapter was scripted in British and European history at dawn on Friday. The deal concluded between Britain and the European Union in Brussels has been greeted with such superlatives as “historic”. A less euphoric assessment would point to a forward movement on a welter of thorny issues, thanks to the renewed efforts of Theresa May and Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission. At another remove and viewed from a rather cynical prism, the agreement reaffirms the concerted effort to minimise the mess that any divorce ~ between persons or nations ~ can entail. The subcontinent, more than any other part of the world, bears witness to the second. And yet the improbables or rough edges ought not to militate against what has been achieved at the high table ~ a compromise on the Irish border, Britain’s divorce bill, and the rights of EU citizens who live in the UK. The British Prime Minister has let it be known that there will be no “hard border” on Ireland and that the 1998 “Good Friday agreement”, so-called, will be honoured. Chiefly, it had ended decades of violence between nationalists, who want a united Ireland, and Northern Ireland unionists who are loyal to Britain. Ergo, Friday’s forward movement signifies a landmark deal both in terms of Anglo-Irish relations and Britain’s equation with Europe in the wider canvas. Mrs May is said to have negotiated into the night to conclude a border deal with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which has claimed that it had secured “substantial changes” to an agreement which it rejected very recently. Specifically, the words, “regulatory alignment”, which had been opposed by the DUP, have been replaced in the revised text with “no regulatory barriers”. The redefinition of the Anglo-Irish frontier is quite the most critical feature of the deal. To summon the words of Mrs May, there will be “no return of checkpoints on the frontier between British-ruled Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland after Britain leaves the latter-day Concert of Europe on 29 March 2019.

A break-up can be a hard experience; harder still is to build a new relationship. And this will be the major test both for Britain and EU in the years to come. For now, both sides have made progress on the two other prickly issues ~ the divorce bill and the welfare rights of three million European citizens in the United Kingdom. Chiefly, the latter will have recourse to the EU’s top court if they feel they are being treated unfairly. No less important is the divorce bill, with Britain now agreeing to pay a settlement amounting to between 45 billion and 55 billion Euros. It is pretty much obvious that the two sides have agreed to a halfway house… both on divorce and debt.