BRUSSELS -- Talks on the United Kingdom leaving the European Union began Monday with both sides saying they will focus first on an orderly withdrawal: a deal for citizens living in each other's territory, border arrangements between Ireland and the U.K., and the amount that the U.K. will pay to get out of previous EU commitments.
EU negotiator Michel Barnier and his British counterpart, David Davis, said after the first negotiating session that they were confident of quick progress but that major challenges lie ahead to meet the March 2019 deadline for the U.K. to officially leave the bloc.
"In the first step, we will deal with the most pressing issues. We must lift the uncertainty caused by Brexit," Barnier said. "In a second step, we will scope our future partnership."
Barnier suggested that the talks will largely follow the EU's conditions and will center on the two sides' new relationship only once sufficient progress has been made on the withdrawal issues.
Davis said he was heartened by the spirit of the talks, during which the negotiators, both interested in mountaineering, exchanged a walking stick and a hiking book.
Barnier said there will be one week of negotiations every month and the two sides will use the time in between to work out proposals. Both sides will immediately put top advisers to work on a border agreement between Ireland and the United Kingdom, aiming to make sure the Irish peace agreement and the common travel area will be as unaffected by the U.K.'s EU departure as possible.
While the EU negotiating team led by Barnier has been ready for months, British efforts on the exit stalled even after it triggered the two-year process March 29. An early election this month, in which British Prime Minister Theresa May lost her Conservative majority in parliament, only added to the problems.
After the U.K.'s June 23, 2016 referendum to leave the bloc, the other 27 nations wanted to start the exit talks as soon as possible so they could work on their own futures, but the process dragged for months.
Even when May triggered the two-year unraveling process in March, she followed it up by calling an early election June 8 that she had hoped would strengthen her majority in parliament, and thus her negotiating mandate with the EU.
The move backfired; May lost her Conservative majority in the vote and has been fending off critics of her leadership ever since.
Still, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson remained upbeat Monday, saying he thinks the negotiations will yield "a happy resolution that can be done with profit and honor for both sides."
Johnson also urged Europeans to look farther down the road.
"The most important thing for us is to look to the horizon, raise our eyes to the horizon. In the long run, this will be good for the U.K. and good for the rest of Europe," Johnson said at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg.
European leaders have repeatedly said that the U.K. need not go through with its plans for divorce -- although they have been tough about what a split would mean if it happens.
"We want to leave the door open to the British," German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel told Germany's Welt am Sonntag newspaper in remarks published Sunday. He said he hoped for a "soft Brexit," which would leave many trade and immigration ties in place.
Barnier, a veteran French politician, has been vested by the European Union's 27 remaining countries to enforce their no-compromise red lines that any deal for the U.K. must not be more favorable than the one it currently has as a full member.
The issues at stake are daunting.
Unresolved is everything from the status of EU citizens living in Britain, to intelligence sharing, to the future of tens of thousands of British jobs that could be wiped out if businesses move to Europe to avoid new trade barriers.
May plans to present EU leaders on Thursday with a proposal that would detail British plans for EU citizens living in the U.K., according to the Times of London, which said the draft would be "generous."
On the European side, leaders have remained united that the U.K. cannot have full access to European markets unless it also allows full access to its own. European demands for British restitution have also increased, from $67 billion a few months ago to $112 billion now.
As Europe grows more confident in its future after the election victory in France of pro-EU President Emmanuel Macron and the growing assurance from German Chancellor Angela Merkel that she will be re-elected in September, analysts say there may be fewer reasons for Europe to compromise.
"They can be more relaxed about Britain crashing out without a deal that could destabilize the EU economy and destabilize the eurozone," said Charles Grant, the director of the Centre for European Reform, a London-based think tank.
Though the basic outlines of a deal could be struck in the allotted time, he said, uncertain British politics could add a challenge.
"The more that Britain is unstable politically, the more difficult it is to complete the talks on time," Grant said.
Information for this article was contributed by Raf Casert of The Associated Press and by Michael Birnbaum of The Washington Post.
A Section on 06/20/2017