Compromise allows UK's divorce from EU to progress

Within six months, Brussels and London have more or less sorted out the initial terms of their divorce and beginning January, the talks will focus on how to spend the two years of transitional period and what the future relations will be like.

The two sides have agreed that the rights of EU citizens in the United Kingdom will be protected and vice versa, and the UK's financial contribution to the European Union will continue until the end of the EU's current budgetary phase in December 2020, though its membership expires on March 29, 2019. And there is to be no hard border between the Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

This has not been an easy process. During the past six months, the bargaining process has been accompanied by quarrels, warnings and even ultimatums, although these elements are normal for any negotiations in which one side is unwillingly involved, as the EU is.