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The Times, Gainesville, Georgia | gainesvilletimes.com
Monday, November 26, 2018 7A
EU seals Brexit deal as May faces hard sell at home
ALASTAIR GRANT I Associated Press
British Prime Minister Theresa May walks past the EU flag at the conclusion
of an EU summit in Brussels, Sunday, Nov. 25.
BY LORNE COOK,
JILL LAWLESS
AND RAF CASERT
Associated Press
BRUSSELS — After months of
hesitation, stop-and-start negotia
tions and resignations, Britain and
the European Union on Sunday
finally sealed an agreement gov
erning the U.K.’s departure from
the bloc next year.
So much for the easy part.
British Prime Minister Theresa
May must now sell the deal to her
divided Parliament — a huge task
considering the intense opposi
tion from pro-Brexit and pro-EU
lawmakers alike — to ensure Brit
ain can leave with a minimum of
upheaval on March 29.
It’s a hard sell. The agreement
leaves Britain outside the EU with
no say but still subject to its rules
and the obligations of membership
at least until the end of 2020, pos
sibly longer. Britons voted to leave
in June 2016, largely over concerns
about immigration and losing sov
ereignty to Brussels.
EU leaders were quick to warn
that no better offer is available.
“I am totally convinced this is
the only deal possible,” European
Commission President Jean-Claude
Juncker said. “Those who think
that by rejecting the deal that they
would have a better deal will be
disappointed the first seconds after
the rejection.”
For once, May was in complete
agreement.
“This is the deal that is on the
table,” she said. “It is the best pos
sible deal. It is the only deal.”
Acknowledging the vast politi
cal and economic consequences of
Brexit, May promised lawmakers
their say before Christmas and said
that it “will be one of the most sig
nificant votes that Parliament has
held for many years.”
She argued that Parliament has
a duty “to deliver Brexit” as voters
have demanded.
“The British people don’t want
to spend any more time arguing
about Brexit,” she said. “They want
a good deal done that fulfils the
vote and allows us to come together
again as a country.”
Not all agree. Main opposition
Labour Party leader Jeremy Cor-
byn called the deal “the result of
a miserable failure of negotiation
that leaves us with the worst of all
worlds,” and said his party would
oppose it. Scottish First Minister
Nicola Sturgeon, whose Scottish
National Party is the third-largest
in Parliament, said lawmakers
“should reject it and back a better
alternative.”
Pro-Brexit former Conservative
leader Iain Duncan Smith said May
should insist on new terms because
the deal “has ceded too much con
trol” to Brussels.
On the EU side, the last big obsta
cle to a deal with Britain was over
come Saturday when Spain lifted
its objections over the disputed
British territory of Gibraltar.
So it took EU leaders only a
matter of minutes at Sunday’s
summit in Brussels to endorse the
withdrawal agreement that settles
Britain’s divorce bill, protects the
rights of U.K. and EU citizens hit by
Brexit and keeps the Irish border
open. They also backed a 26-page
document laying out their aims for
relations after Brexit.
Still, the event was tinged with
sadness on the European side at
Britain’s departure, the first time
a country will leave the 28-nation
bloc.
German Chancellor Angela
Merkel said her feelings were
“ambivalent, with sadness, but on
the other hand, also some kind of
relief that we made it to this point.”
“I think we managed to make a
diplomatic piece of art,” she said.
Dutch Prime Minister Mark
Rutte said the deal — the product
of a year and a half of often- gruel
ing negotiations — was regrettable
but acceptable.
“I believe that nobody is win
ning. We are all losing because of
the U.K. leaving,” Rutte said. “But
given that context, this is a bal
anced outcome with no political
winners.”
May said she wasn’t sad, because
Britain and the EU would remain
“friends and neighbors.”
“I recognize some European
leaders are sad at this moment,
but also some people back at
home in the U.K. will be sad at this
moment,” she told reporters, but
insisted that she was “full of opti
mism” about Britain’s future.
The European Parliament,
meanwhile, will be in full cam
paign mode a few months ahead
of the EU elections when Europe’s
lawmakers sit to endorse the agree
ment, probably in February, but
perhaps as late as March, accord
ing to the assembly’s president,
Antonio Tajani.
Still, Tajani said a “large major
ity” of European parliamentarians
support the deal.
Dolce&Gabbana trip up in China riling millions of internet users
BY KEN M0RITSUGU AND
COLLEEN BARRY
Associated Press
BEIJING — Don’t mess
with China and its growing
cadre of powerful luxury
consumers.
That’s the lesson
Dolce&Gabbana learned
the hard way when it faced
a boycott after Chinese neti-
zens expressed outrage over
what were seen as culturally
insensitive videos promot
ing a major runway show in
Shanghai and subsequent
posts of insulting comments
in a private Instagram chat.
The company blamed
hackers for the anti-Chinese
insults, but the explana
tion felt flat to many and
the damage was done. The
Milan designers canceled
the Shanghai runway show,
meant as a tribute to China,
as their guest list of Asian
A-listers quickly joined the
protests.
Then, as retailers pulled
their merchandise from
shelves and powerful
e-commerce sites deleted
their wares, co-founders
Domenico Dolce and Stefano
Gabbana went on camera —
dwarfed against the larger
backdrop of an ornate red
wall-covering — to apologize
to the Chinese people.
“We will never forget this
experience, and it will defi
nitely never happen again,”
a solemn-looking Gabbana
said in a video statement
posted Friday on social
media.
The apology video, and
the sharp public backlash
that demanded it, shows the
importance of the Chinese
market and the risks of oper
ating in it. More broadly,
it highlights the huge and
still-growing influence of
China, a country that can
not be ignored as it expands
economically, militarily and
diplomatically.
These trends are inter
twined in frequent outbursts
of nationalist sentiment
among consumers who feel
slighted by foreign brands
or their governments. It’s
not the first time a company
has apologized, and it surely
won’t be the last. Mercedes-
Benz did so in February
for featuring a quote by the
Dalai Lama on its Instagram
account.
For Dolce&Gabbana, it
could be mark the end of
its growth in China, a mar
ket critical to global luxury
brands that it has cultivated
since opening its first store in
2005 and where it now has 44
boutiques.
“I think it is going to be
impossible over the next cou
ple of years for them to work
in China,” said Cary Cooper,
a professor of organizational
psychology and health at
Manchester University in
England. “When you break
this kind of cultural codes,
then you are in trouble. The
brand is now damaged in
China, and I think it will be
damaged in China until there
is lost memory about it.”
That could shake
Dolce&Gabbana’s financial
health. The privately held
company does not release
its individual sales figures.
But Chinese consumers are
responsible for a third of all
luxury spending around the
globe, according to a recent
study by Bain consultancy.
That will grow to 46 percent
of forecast sales of an esti
mated 365 billion euros ($412
billion) by 2025, fueled by
millennials and the younger
Generation Z set, who will
make a growing percentage
of their purchases online.
“Without China, the hin
terland for growth, D&G will
obviously be in a weak com
petitive position and in dan
ger of being eliminated,” the
Chinese business magazine
New Fortune said in a social
media post Sunday. “This
is one of the major reasons
why D&G finally lowered
its head. They really cannot
survive without the Chinese
market.”
While Dolce&Gabbana
has displayed a knack for
social media engagement,
inviting millennial influenc
es with millions of collec
tive followers to sit in their
front rows or walk in their
NG HAN GUAN I Associated Press
A man walks past a Dolce&Gabbana store in Beijing, China,
Nov. 21. Dolce&Gabbana faced a boycott after Chinese
netizens expressed outrage over what were seen as
culturally insensitive videos promoting a major runway show
in Shanghai and subsequent posts of insulting comments in
a private Instagram chat.
shows, that engagement has
been a double-edged sword.
Pop idol Karry Wang, who
has drawn hundreds of
screaming Chinese fans to
the designer’s Milan show
room for season runway
shows, was one of the first to
disavow the brand, saying he
was ending his role as Asia-
Pacific brand ambassador.
Dolce found himself on
the defensive several years
ago after Elton John lashed
out for comments that sug
gested he did not support
gay couples using surrogate
mothers to have children. At
the time, more than 67,000
tweets urged #boycottdol-
cegabbana, while Courtney
Love vowed to burn her
Dolce&Gabbana garb and
Martina Navritalova pledged
to trash her D&G shirts.
Gabbana, who has 1.6
million Instagram follow
ers, faced a more contained
backlash earlier this year
when he responded to a col
lage of Selena Gomez photos
on Instagram with the com
ment, “She’s really ugly.”
Zhang and other celeb
rities took to social media
Wednesday to blast
Dolce&Gabbana and said
they would boycott the show,
which was canceled. By
Thursday, the company’s
goods had disappeared from
Little & Davenport
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The prevailing sentiment
was captured by an airport
duty-free shop that posted a
photo of its shelves emptied
of D&G products: “We have
to show our stance. We are
proud to be Chinese.”
The rapid escalation into
a public relations disas
ter was fueled by social
media. Individuals posted
videos of themselves cut
ting up or burning their
Dolce&Gabbana clothes, or
picking them up with chop
sticks and putting them in the
trash. A parody of the offend
ing Dolce&Gabbana videos,
which featured a Chinese
woman using chopsticks to
eat pizza and an oversized
cannoli, shows a white man
trying to eat Chinese food
with a fork and knife. At least
three rap bands took up the
cause with new songs.
“Companies that don’t
respect us don’t deserve our
respect,” Wang Zixin, team
leader of CD Rev, a national
ist rap band, said by phone
from Chengdu, the capital
of Sichuan province. Its new
song had been viewed more
than 850,000 times on Weibo.
“We hope people will
remember companies that
have ever insulted China,
and not forget about them
when the fallout passes,”
Wang said.
That sense of pride
reflects a nationalism that
has been encouraged by the
government, often in dis
putes China has with other
countries over other foreign
products.
Sales by Japanese auto
makers plunged in 2012
amid tensions between
islands both countries claim
in the East China Sea. The
clash also illustrated the
complexity of Chinese senti
ment: Industry analysts said
buyers didn’t want to be seen
in Japanese auto showrooms
but went ahead with planned
purchases once tensions had
passed.
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