No-Deal Brexit Won’t Affect European Security, MI6 Chief Says

(Bloomberg) -- Brexit won’t substantially change European intelligence-sharing networks, the chief of the U.K.’s foreign spy agency, MI6, said, downplaying the effect a no-deal departure on security across the continent.

“The relationships between European countries that exist on intelligence and security are not within the competence of the European Union and it does not, even now, therefore cover these relationships,” Alex Younger told reporters at a security conference in Munich. He offered up an “unconditional” post-Brexit security relationship with Britain’s European allies.

“That is important at a moral level as an expression of solidarity,” Younger said. “But it also just shows the reality of how we work and the fact that we need each other and it’s a two-way street. Brexit doesn’t fundamentally alter those relationships.”

Younger spoke to reporters before a panel discussion with Bruno Kahl, president of Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service, and Bernard Emie, head of the French DGSE national foreign intelligence agency. The relationship with the U.K.’s European partners “is closer than I have known it in my 30 years as an intelligence officer,” he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Kitty Donaldson in Munich at kdonaldson1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Alex Morales, Stuart Biggs

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