U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s plan to stick to a 2020 Brexit transition period revives the risk of the country’s ties to the European Union being severed disruptively, according to the bloc’s chief civil servant for trade policy. Sabine Weyand, director general for trade in the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, cautioned that Johnson’s intention to prevent any prolongation of the Brexit transition period beyond 2020 would require the bloc to plan accordingly. “We are well advised to take seriously that the U.K. does not intend to go for an extension of the transition,” Weyand told a European Policy ... (full story)